- Buyk has chosen the restaurant vet James Walker as new CEO, as the startup expands in the US.
- Walker sees advantages in the ultrafast model over restaurant delivery. “We control the inventory.”
- The ultrafast segment has plenty of detractors and competitors, but Walker isn’t deterred.
The ultrafast delivery segment is a crowded space filled with venture-capital-backed startups with similar business plans. But James Walker, a former executive at Subway and Nathan’s Famous, is betting New York City-based Buyk will come out on top as he begins his new role as the company’s first CEO.
“I don’t like to lose,” Walker said while discussing his new post with Insider at a Buyk microfulfillment warehouse in New York’s Upper East Side.
Walker, who officially starts his role Monday, isn’t an obvious choice to run a company in ultrafast delivery, where tech-enabled startups are competing to bring select groceries to consumers in under 30 minutes.
Walker’s previous employer, Nathan’s Famous, is the furthest thing from a startup. The hot-dog brand is over 100 years old. But Walker was pushing the boundaries on tech at the company as senior vice president, forging partnerships with ghost-kitchen operators and various third-party delivery companies. Walker also was an advisor to a number of tech startups and completed MIT’s Artificial Intelligence: Implications for Business Strategy program.
“Food-adjacent technology, hyper-accessibility, hyper-convenience is something that I’ve been really focused on,” he said.
Walker said Buyk and other ultrafast players have an advantage when compared to third-party delivery companies, like DoorDash,
Uber Eats
, and Instacart.
The main difference — “we control the inventory,” he said. “We control the last mile. It puts us in a position where from a transactional-level economic standpoint, we’re removing middlemen, we’re removing partners. So it really is Buyk and the customer. So we’re able to execute a transaction that’s better from a price-value standpoint with the customer, as well as better for us from a profitability standpoint.”
Buyk, like many of its competitors, hires employees to stock warehouses and deliver products, whereas companies like DoorDash and Uber Eats use gig workers.
Buyk
Buyk, pronounced “bike,” launched its dark-store operation in parts of Manhattan in August. The fast-growing company now has 20 microfulfillment locations in New York that stock about 2,000-3,000 curated products. Buyk plans to launch in Chicago next.
Buyk was founded by Slava Bocharov and Rodion Shishkov, who also founded the successful ultrafast-delivery service Samokat in Russia, which they sold last year.
“I think what’s going to be key in ultimately a battle I believe we’ve already won, is a proven business model,” Walker said. “We’re a startup here in the US, and it feels like that, and things are taped to the wall and, you know, we’ve got new employees and we’re learning a lot of things. It is based on a proven, highly successful business model in Europe.”
In the US, Buyk is facing stiff competition and plenty of naysayers who question how it and other ultrafast startups can make a profit even without major competition.
In New York City alone, there are five other startups looking to deliver grocery- and convenience-store staples within 15 minutes. And the segment is heavily subsidized by venture capital. Food- and grocery-delivery startups have received $21.1 billion from investors this year, according to the latest data from CB Insights. Buyk’s latest funding numbers put it at $46 million.
Walker believes the cofounders’ use of technology and analytics and their credentials will set Buyk up for success.
Plus he’s up for a challenge. “I’m very comfortable doing the impossible every day,” he said. “I think it’s as simple as that.”
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