As we approach universal smart phone ownership among American consumers, retailers and startup entrepreneurs are scrambling for ways to integrate mobile into the everyday shopping experience. In April of last year, PayDragon launched its mobile food ordering and pre-payment platform allowing hungry restaurant guests to skip the lines at their favorite eatery. The service is now live in Los Angeles, Portland, Seattle, and Tucson.
The company followed this up with a September redesign that added the option to purchase non-perishable household products for home delivery as simply as scanning the barcode on the package already in their kitchen, bathroom, or garage. It has been a big hit. The marketplace currently offers 10,000 items which effectively includes every shelf-stable product you can buy at Ralphs, Trader Joes, Whole Foods, and Walgreens, or their local equivalent – all available via iOS and Android apps
Since its re-launch last fall, the company has seen this mobile ordering activity explode, with revenue growing at 35 percent per week on average for the last seven plus month, with “thousands of orders” now placed each month, according to founder and CEO Hamilton Chan. Unlike many personal shopping platforms, PayDragon is not taking a slow and steady approach to its geographic roll out. The service is available throughout the US and has completed orders in 45 of the 50 states.
“We would like to be known as the definitive app for buying anything quickly,” Chan says, adding that the groceries service is most popular among affluent males. “We like to joke that we’re ‘maximum laziness enhanced.’”
