- Yum China approaches delivery a little bit differently from its competitors.
- Unlike its competitors, which tend to outsource delivery, CEO Joey Wat said the company preferred to keep delivery in-house.
- Business Insider spoke with Wat at the World Economic Forum about the brand's plans for growth, and delivery is a huge part of them.
- "Because I'm a foodie, I love food. I want to make sure that by the time the food reaches the customer, the food is still nice and warm," Wat said.
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DAVOS, Switzerland — Yum China does delivery differently from its competitors, and it's all because its CEO, Joey Wat, really loves food.
Yum China was originally part of Yum Brands but spun off from its US parent company in 2016. Wat, who was previously the CEO of KFC China, became CEO of Yum China in 2018.
Business Insider spoke with Wat at the World Economic Forum in Davos about the brand's plans for growth. Wat is optimistic about Yum's potential for expansion, and she sees delivery as one of the brand's most important avenues for growth.
"The growth of delivery in China has been phenomenal in the last few years, and it will continue to grow," Wat told Business Insider.
Wat sees delivery as a two-part challenge: sourcing traffic and delivering food. While KFC and Pizza Hut account for 60% of its traffic through delivery aggregators, it gets the remaining 40% of its delivery traffic through Yum's Super Apps.
"But when it comes to delivery, we do it 100% ourselves," Wat said. "And that is something that only Yum China does compared to our competitors. The rest of them will have some kind of business partner do the delivery for them."
The reason is simple: "Because I'm a foodie, I love food. I want to make sure that by the time the food reaches the customer, the food is still nice and warm," she said.
She attributes the explosive growth of the delivery sector to two things: major advances in technology in the past few years and China's high rate of female employment.
"When wives are busy, delivery comes simply because you don't have time to cook," Wat said. "There is a real demand there."
Yum's Super Apps, which launched in 2015 at KFC and 2017 at Pizza Hut, are designed to accommodate working women who need to feed their families. They come with a variety of unusual features, including an audiobook playlist, a virtual shopping mall, and the capability to control the lighting in select KFC and Pizza Hut stores.
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