Today in Food Commerce: DoorDash Partners With Wix; Restaurants Tap Conversational Commerce

Today in food commerce, DoorDash announces an integration with Wix to enable fulfillment through restaurants’ websites, while a pizza chain tests out artificial intelligence (AI) voice ordering at 50 stores. Plus, American Express President of U.S. Merchant Services Colleen Taylor speaks with PYMNTS about the challenges facing today’s independent restaurants.

DoorDash Steps up Its White-Label Efforts in the ResTech Race to ‘Digital Entirety’

As digital restaurant ordering solution providers compete to have a hand in the greatest share of total restaurant orders, DoorDash is making moves to grow its reach well beyond its marketplace. The aggregator has announced a partnership with website building platform Wix to integrate its DoorDash Drive white-label fulfillment platform into restaurants’ Wix sites and apps.

Restaurants Leverage Conversational AI to Automate Order-Taking

Ohio-based chain Marco’s Pizza, which has more than 1,000 stores in the U.S. and the Bahamas, has announced that it is testing a voice-to-text ordering system at 50 locations whereby consumers call in their orders, and the technology converts the order to text and alerts employees.

Amex: Independent Restaurants Digitally Adapt but See in-Person Demand

“The impacts of the pandemic continue to be a prominent issue facing many independent restaurants,” American Express President of U.S. Merchant Services Colleen Taylor told PYMNTS in an interview. “From new waves and variants threatening in-person business to supply chain issues, there are still many challenges that restaurant owners are having to navigate.”