Lunch delivery in Mumbai- Dabbawalas
There has been a lot written on Mumbai “Dabbawalas”.
- Prince Charles, invited them for his wedding. (Two of Dabbawalas attended )
- FedEx envy them, and wanted to understand their delivery system.
- There has been a film on Dabbawalas “The Lunchbox”.
- Harvard Business Review assigned the Dabbawala system a six sigma rating, in spite of the fact that they use no technology whatsoever (Not sure of this news though)
The dabbawalas constitute a lunchbox delivery and return system that delivers hot lunches from homes and restaurants to people at work in India, especially in Mumbai. The lunchboxes are picked up in the late morning, delivered predominantly using bicycles and railway trains, and returned empty in the afternoon.
They are also used by meal suppliers in Mumbai, who pay them to ferry lunchboxes with ready-cooked meals from central kitchens to customers and back.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dabbawala
The Dabbawalla service is now a Rs40-45-crore industry ($ 6-7 Millions), with 5,000 delivery men transporting 200,000 lunch boxes daily for an average monthly fee of Rs 450-500 (US$ 7-8) a box.