A top Deliveroo boss has revealed the "secret formula" for being successful in Manchester as the delivery giant launched a new office in the city centre and tripled its headcount.
The company has relocated to a new base in New York Street near Piccadilly Gardens.
The new flagship office comes after the company grew the number of employees in Manchester to around 180.
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The expansion also comes after the number of restaurants available on Deliveroo in the city increased by almost 150% to more than 2,900 since February 2020.
In an exclusive interview with BusinessLive, Deliveroo’s chief business officer UK&I Carlo Mocci revealed he expects the Manchester team to continue to grow, as well as the 'secret formula to win a city'.
He said: "I like the new office very much. I think that it's a great space.
"When the previous office closed during the pandemic, we spent a lot of time designing it and the team is quite excited.
"It is probably the best office we have outside of London.
"The team size is very different to how it was before the pandemic so we would not have been able to stay at our old location.
"We have a commercial team and operations and marketing team who are based in Manchester and who run the region from here.
"That's a model that we have across the UK; local offices take care of their local partners and businesses.
"Our small individual business team is the commercial team that deals with all of the small independent restaurants across the UK.
"This is a team that is based entirely out of Manchester and takes responsibility for all of the business of that specific segment for all of the UK and Ireland.
"This team could be based in London or in other cities but we decided to place it in Manchester a few years ago and we have been very happy with how that team has grown."
On creating more jobs at the company's Manchester office, he added: "We are a high growth company and headcount follows the evolution of the business.
"We don't have a set number but the team will probably grow organically but not at the same speed we have had over the last 12 months, which has been really strong for a number of reasons.
"However we do expect that this team will continue growing."
Mr Mocci has also revealed the 'secret formula to win a city' and come out on top against rivals such as UberEats and JustEat.
He said: "Our business is one that is extremely local. When it comes to Manchester we have great business with local chains but in order to really win a city the secret formula is to make sure that you are mixing those national brands that everybody knows with your local favourites.
"The way we operate is by having local commercial teams that will take the commercial relationship with those local chains which essentially are smaller players but they are structured operators and they expect to be managed with typical commercial relationships.
"When it comes to the smaller independents that's much more of a different relationship because in many cases these are passionate restaurateurs but not necessarily the most savvy operators to start with.
"There is a lot of work that we do to onboard them and explain what we can do for them - there is a lot of education that comes with that journey."
