From left: Declan Magee, Elkstone Partners; James and Conor McCarthy, Flipdish; Ruairi O’Neill, Elkstone Partners; and Alan Merriman, Elkstone Private. Image: Elkstone
Flipdish nourishes restaurateurs as they digitally transform.
Dublin start-up Flipdish, which builds, designs and operates own-label food-ordering apps and websites for restaurants, has raised €2m in funding.
The investment was led by Dublin-based investment firm Elkstone.
‘At Flipdish, we are on a mission to give the restaurateurs back control of their business and destiny’
– CONOR MCCARTHY
This brings the total funding raised to date by the tech start-up to almost €3m.
It has also more than doubled its team from eight to 20 in the last 12 months, with plans to add a further 10 employees in the near future.
Launched in 2015 by James and Conor McCarthy, the Dublin-based start-up has developed an online ordering platform for the restaurant and takeaway market. It builds individual apps and websites branded under each client’s own name, increasing customer loyalty and retention.
Nom numbers
From left: Flipdish founders James and Conor McCarthy. Image: Elkstone
Flipdish has more than 500 stores using its platform in Ireland with a potential market in excess of 4,000.
It also has 100 UK stores with a potential market of 40,000. The size of the wider European market is potentially 700,000 stores.
To date, Flipdish clients include Mao, Bombay Pantry, Chopped, Centra, Londis, Macari’s and Base Wood Fired Pizza, among others.
“At Flipdish, we are on a mission to give the restaurateurs back control of their business and destiny by giving them a direct relationship with their customers, reducing their costs, and providing the tools to compete and win online,” CEO and co-founder Conor McCarthy explained.
“This investment will make significant improvements to the existing Flipdish product to help restaurants succeed online, while also extending the product offering into six additional European countries. We want to provide every restaurant in Europe with the tools and opportunity to excel online and remove the need to rely on costly food portals.”
The Flipdish platform provides a wealth of data that helps clients understand and improve their own business based on their own customer behaviours and purchases.
Future plans for Flipdish include building out the product offering, enabling takeaways, cafés, delis and quick-service restaurants to increase their customer value and retention through loyalty systems. It is said that there is currently no white-label online ordering solution capable of serving European countries well, and Flipdish is planning to become that service.
“Backing innovative people and early-stage businesses is core to our venture investment strategy at Elkstone,” said Declan Magee, head of venture at Elkstone.
“Conor and James have built a great product with strong traction in the local market. This funding round will lead the sales roll-out into Europe, along with further product development.”
