If delivery isn't a core part of the business and there isn't something for the delivery driver to do when there are no deliveries, having staff to do those deliveries isn't viable.
At my local pizza place, the delivery drivers are also wait staff and cooks (not primarily, but are able to serve in those capacities). When there are no deliveries, they're working (and getting paid) - the majority of the time, they're a pizza place and doing deliveries. Dominoes excels at doing this at scale.
But if you're the local sit down brew pub delivery isn't part of your standard thing. You can't hire a person to be a driver with the expectation that they'll do one delivery a night... and then what do you do on the nights they don't work?
A restaurant that isn't set up with deliveries being a primary source of getting to food to the customer - which includes having the staffing levels/tasks for delivery high and low - the economics of it doesn't favor adding staff to do it.
Note that deliveries also take a certain commitment of capital to make sure that the packaging for the food is appropriate for take away and that the delivery vehicle has the proper things to make that work (keeping food hot or cold as appropriate).
Having staff that can meet the demand as appropriate is key there for customer expectations. If you call for delivery and the wait time is 2h because they only have one driver that does an out and back each time - that's not going to be good.
So they could... but it an investment in staff that needs to be flexible in time and task, in packing for takeout, and in vehicle equipment. Unless this is to add a reasonable bit to revenue, the additional planning and logistical difficulty isn't worth it.
At my local pizza place, the delivery drivers are also wait staff and cooks (not primarily, but are able to serve in those capacities). When there are no deliveries, they're working (and getting paid) - the majority of the time, they're a pizza place and doing deliveries. Dominoes excels at doing this at scale.
But if you're the local sit down brew pub delivery isn't part of your standard thing. You can't hire a person to be a driver with the expectation that they'll do one delivery a night... and then what do you do on the nights they don't work?
A restaurant that isn't set up with deliveries being a primary source of getting to food to the customer - which includes having the staffing levels/tasks for delivery high and low - the economics of it doesn't favor adding staff to do it.
Note that deliveries also take a certain commitment of capital to make sure that the packaging for the food is appropriate for take away and that the delivery vehicle has the proper things to make that work (keeping food hot or cold as appropriate).
Having staff that can meet the demand as appropriate is key there for customer expectations. If you call for delivery and the wait time is 2h because they only have one driver that does an out and back each time - that's not going to be good.
So they could... but it an investment in staff that needs to be flexible in time and task, in packing for takeout, and in vehicle equipment. Unless this is to add a reasonable bit to revenue, the additional planning and logistical difficulty isn't worth it.