From Nike to Nasi Lemak: What Retailers Can Teach Restaurants About Pricing

From the Desk of Jonathan Lim, Founder & CEO, Oddle

I was chatting with a restaurant owner the other day about pricing.

He told me he wanted to grow revenue through deliveries, especially during quieter hours like 5–6pm. His thinking was simple: if a customer usually spends $100 on food, why not run a 10% early dine-in promo at $90 to fill seats — and then run a delivery discount too?

That’s when he asked me the million-dollar question:

“So how much should I discount for deliveries?”

My answer: tread carefully.

Because the moment you make delivery cheaper than dine-in, you’re training your customers not to walk into your restaurant. And once that habit forms, it’s very hard to undo.

Retailers learnt this lesson the hard way.

The Retail Playbook

Walk into Nike’s Orchard Road store, and the latest sneakers are proudly displayed at full price. Go online a week later, and you might find the same pair slightly cheaper. Wait another season, and the leftovers show up on Zalora at half price.

Retailers have spent decades figuring out how to juggle prices across channels without shooting themselves in the foot. They know one thing: if you slip up, you lose your customers.

• Flagship stores carry the latest, in-season items. Customers pay full price, but they also get the full brand experience.

• Direct online stores offer convenience and range, but often launch later than the store to keep foot traffic alive.

• Marketplaces? That’s where the old stock goes to be cleared out at deep discounts.

And when brands mess this up — letting the marketplace undercut the store — shoppers stop showing up. Once habits shift, they don’t shift back. The retail graveyard is full of brands that learned this too late.

Restaurants Have Their Own Ladder

Restaurants don’t get the luxury of “end-of-season sales.” You can’t exactly sell yesterday’s nasi lemak at half price. Food is perishable, cooked fresh, and consumed on the spot.

But the same channel logic still applies.

• Dine-in → must always be the cheapest. Think of it as your flagship store. This is where your brand comes alive — ambience, hospitality, theatre.

• Direct delivery store → priced in the middle. Not just a copy of the dine-in menu — this is where you curate bigger baskets, family sets, or exclusive offerings. Better margins, and more importantly, you actually know who your customer is.

• Marketplaces → the most expensive. These platforms specialise in small, instant orders, and they charge you for reach. They’re an acquisition channel, not your profit centre.

Why It Matters

Pricing isn’t just about numbers on a menu — it shapes customer behaviour.

• If dine-in feels overpriced, people stop showing up.
• If delivery is cheaper than dine-in, they’ll default to staying home.
• If marketplaces undercut your direct store, why would anyone ever order from you directly?

This is the same trap retail fell into. Once customers discover the “cheapest channel,” they’ll stick to it — and you’ll struggle to bring them back.

A Simple Rule of Thumb

• Mark up your delivery menu by around 20%.
• Run promos of 10–15% on top of that markup if you want to drive volume.
• But never cross the line where delivery is cheaper than dine-in.

That line is sacred.

Look Beyond F&B

Restaurant owners often think their struggles are unique. They’re not. Retailers, airlines, hotels, even telcos have fought these pricing battles long before you.

The smart operators borrow playbooks from outside their own industry. Because mispricing doesn’t just cost you margin. It changes behaviour. And once habits change, it’s a long road back.

If you train customers to chase discounts, you lose your store.

If you train customers to stay home, you lose your restaurant.

👀 Curious where your restaurant stands today?

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