Zomato has decided to drop the green dress code for riders carrying only vegetarian food after the introduction of the “Pure Veg Mode” sparked intense debate across social media platforms. Zomato founder and CEO Deepinder Goyal addressed the backlash and conveyed the decision via social media.
In a post on X (formerly Twitter), the CEO said, “While we are going to continue to have a fleet for vegetarians, we have decided to remove the on-ground segregation of this fleet on the ground using the colour green. All our riders — both our regular fleet, and our fleet for vegetarians, will wear the colour red.”
“This means 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),” he added.
What is Zomato’s ‘Pure Veg Mode’ and ‘Pure Veg Fleet’?
Goyal informed that the introduction of the ‘Pure Veg Mode’ and ‘Pure Veg Fleet’ is aimed at catering exclusively to customers who follow a 100 per cent vegetarian diet. Goyal elaborated upon the reason behind introduction of the company’s “Pure Veg Mode” service. He added that this initiative is neutral and does not favor or isolate any religious or political groups.
In another post on X, the CEO clarified that the feature aims to accommodate customers who avoid ordering from establishments serving meat, irrespective of their religious or caste affiliations.
“But why did we need to separate the fleets? 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,” Goyal clarified in the post.
Zomato founder also assured that participation in the vegetarian delivery fleet would not discriminate based on the dietary choices of the delivery partners.
“There’s 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,” the CEO added.
‘Will roll it back in a heartbeat’
The food delivery platform is willing to roll back the initiative in a heartbeat if there is a negative social repercussions. “And I promise, that if we see any significant negative social repercussions of this change, we will roll it back in a heartbeat,” Goyal asserted.
This development comes a day after the food delivery platform announced a dedicated fleet intended to exclusively serve orders from ‘pure veg’ restaurants and said that these deliveries will be made in distinctive green boxes.