The next phrase out of Mark Zuckerberg may be, “You want fries with that?” as Facebook rolls out a feature that will allow you to order food from local restaurants.
The feature, dubbed “Order Food” on the site, teams the tech giant with food ordering services such as GrubHub, EatStreet, Delivery.com, ChowNow and Olo.
According to Facebook vice president and project leader Alex Himel, the goal of the feature is to simplify food delivery, which he says has gotten complicated with the slew of options that have popped up in recent years.
“People already go to Facebook to figure out what to eat by reading about nearby restaurants, and seeing what their friends say about them,” Himel said. “So, we’re making it even easier.”
Hungry customers will be shown a list of participating restaurants in their area, including national chains like Five Guys, Panera, Papa John’s and Chipotle, and will be able to select whether they are ordering for pick-up or delivery.
The way it works is simple. After selecting a restaurant and delivery method, users will be able to peruse the culinary offerings from each establishment, and build their order without ever leaving the site.
For restaurants that have partnerships with multiple delivery services, customers can select which one they want to use. So GrubHub loyalists don’t necessarily need to create an EatStreet account if they don’t want to. And users who don’t have accounts with any delivery services can create them on the Order Food page.
According to Himel, the feature has been in testing for the past year, and will now be available on Facebook’s mobile apps as well as its desktop site.
This is the latest feature rolled out by Facebook with the goal of keeping you on the site as long as possible. It previously debuted a feature allowing users to transfer money to one another, and also lets users book appointments and check weather forecasts.
Like Amazon’s food delivery service, Facebook doesn’t appear to be making any money off of the endeavor. What they are getting is valuable data and information on user behavior, according to Bloomberg.
Facebook shares on Friday rose 0.7 percent to $173.74.