Zomato shuns ‘green uniform’ decision amid backlash

Following the launch of its ‘Pure Veg Mode’ service on Tuesday, Zomato CEO Deepinder Goyal today rolled back the decision partially, saying Zomato will not do the on-ground segregation of the fleet in "terms of colour" to avoid discrimination.

"All our riders — both our regular fleet and our fleet for vegetarians, will wear the colour red," Goyal says via a tweet update. He adds that the fleet meant for vegetarian orders will not be identifiable on the ground (but will show on the app that your veg orders will be served by the veg-only fleet).

Zomato had on Tuesday introduced 'Pure Veg Mode' and 'Pure Veg Fleet' catering to customers who exclusively follow a vegetarian diet. Under the 'Pure Veg Mode,' restaurants exclusively offering vegetarian cuisine will be listed, excluding any establishments serving non-vegetarian dishes.

The Zomato Ltd share is trading 1.65 points or 1.04% up at ₹159.60 on the NSE.

Soon after the launch, Zomato started receiving comments from a section of people on social media, many of whom said delivery boys could face backlash in many areas based on the colour of their uniform and it could also lead to the strengthening of caste segregation.

Goyal says the rollback of the decision on green dress will ensure that its "red uniform delivery partners" are not incorrectly associated with non-veg food, and blocked by any RWAs or societies during any special days. "Our riders’ physical safety is of paramount importance to us."

Goyal says the company has now realised that even some of its customers could get into trouble with their landlords, and "that would not be a nice thing if that happened because of us".

"Thanks everyone for talking about this last night. You made us understand the unintended consequences of this rollout. All the love, and all the brickbats were all so useful - and helped us get to this optimal point. We are always listening, without unnecessary ego, or pride. We look forward to continue serving you."

Many users reacted appreciating Zomato's decision to roll back the move. "Good decision. The best part is when people criticized this decision, you or your team read it, understood it, and changed it without taking it to your ego," wrote a user named @Bhai_saheb on X.

However, many faced dilemmas on how users will identify if it's the "pure veg" fleet. "So how we know it's the "pure veg" fleet ? You might be charging extra and we pure veg people will have to share the delivery box with unpure non veg food ..." wrote one @mikejava85 on X.

After the launch of the new service on Tuesday, Goyal said on X that though he received an overwhelmingly positive response on this launch, there was an opinion that some societies and RWAs will now not let our regular fleet in. "We will stay alert for any such cases and work with these RWAs to not let this happen. We understand our social responsibility due to this change, and we will not back down from solving it when the need arises," he had said.

"I would like to repeat that this feature strictly serves a dietary preference. And I know there are a lot of customers who would never order food from a restaurant which serves meat, irrespective of their religion/caste."

Explaining the rationale behind the decision to separate the fleets, Goyal said: "Because despite everyone's best efforts, sometimes the food spills into the delivery boxes. In those cases, the smell of the previous order travels to the next order and may lead to the next order smelling of the previous order. For this reason, we had to separate the fleet for veg orders."

He said participation in its "Veg delivery fleet" will not discriminate based on our delivery partner’s dietary preferences. "And I promise, that if we see any significant negative social repercussions of this change, we will roll it back in a heartbeat."