page_title: Ghost restaurant
hierarchical_section_title: Ghost restaurant
context_page_description: A ghost restaurant is a food service business that serves customers exclusively by delivery based on phone orders or online food ordering. By not having a full-service restaurant premise with a storefront and dining room, ghost restaurants can economize by occupying cheaper real estate.
  Although restaurants typically earn more from customers who dine at a restaurant, due to the money saved by not having a dining room and not hiring waitstaff, ghost restaurants have significantly lower overhead and thus higher profit margins. Operating a dining room, with the real estate it requires, staff, amenities, insurance, and other expenses, entails a significant cost. Even restaurants with considerable to-go business traditionally dedicate the majority of their space to seating. As visibility, curb appeal, foot traffic, and accessibility are not concerns, the kitchen can be housed in an inexpensive location that would not typically be considered desirable for a restaurant. City councils in the UK have expressed concerns about expansion because residents have complained about noise from delivery traffic.
context_section_description: A ghost restaurant is a food service business that serves customers exclusively by delivery based on phone orders or online food ordering. By not having a full-service restaurant premise with a storefront and dining room, ghost restaurants can economize by occupying cheaper real estate.   
  Although restaurants typically earn more from customers who dine at a restaurant, due to the money saved by not having a dining room and not hiring waitstaff, ghost restaurants have significantly lower overhead (even taking into account the expense of operating a delivery service or the fees charged by third party delivery companies like Grubhub and Caviar) and thus higher profit margins. Operating a dining room, with the real estate it requires, staff, amenities, insurance, and other expenses, entails a significant cost. Even restaurants with considerable to-go (British: takeaway) business traditionally dedicate the majority of their space to seating. As visibility, curb appeal, foot traffic, and accessibility are not concerns, the kitchen can be housed in an inexpensive location that would not typically be considered desirable for a restaurant.  City councils in the UK have expressed concerns about expansion because residents have complained about noise from delivery traffic.
  A typical ghost restaurant location is able to accommodate the preparation of several different types of cuisines. Green Summit Group, for instance, operates several restaurant concepts from a single location. Without a brick-and-mortar dining location to renovate, front-of-house staff, and paper menus to reprint, companies can also try out new brands and cuisines with less effort and expense. The strategy of having multiple brands and cuisines can target a broader range of customers. 
  Most of the restaurants use existing third party delivery services. For example, Green Summit, which owns several ghost restaurants in Chicago and New York City and partners with Grubhub. Keatz operates kitchens in Europe. Some companies incorporate their own delivery system into the business model, as was the case with the now defunct New York-based company Maple. Maple, which was partly backed by restaurateur David Chang, oriented its business around productivity in terms of meals per hour per kitchen — a metric more typical of fast food restaurants. Finding the correct business model seems to be a challenge -- Maple ceased operations in May 2017 and sold to the UK food-delivery company, Deliveroo. Ando, the delivery-only restaurant launched in 2016, also a David Chang venture, closed doors in January 2018 and was sold to Uber Eats.
  Ghost restaurants have been criticized for their unpleasant working conditions and cramped, windowless kitchen spaces. Several 2015 news articles found some "ghost restaurants" operated as unregulated, unlicensed standalone entities or as "fronts" for restaurants that might or might not have health code violations.
caption: A ghost restaurant in Columbus, Ohio in 2020 that specializes in online deliveries via Uber Eats and other similar services. Note its warehouse-like appearance that is not typical of a traditional restaurant.