Zomato has doubled down on its Gold subscription programme amid the COVID-19 crisis as the foodtech unicorn renamed the dining membership as Zomato Pro after signing up about 50 per cent more restaurant partners.
Zomato announced extra perks like priority delivery and a money-back guarantee programme for all Pro members.
As a result of the new changes, all Zomato Gold members across 10 countries will automatically get upgraded to Zomato Pro starting August 1, the company said.
"We have signed up approximately 50 per cent more partner restaurants on Zomato Pro than what we had on Zomato Gold -- across dining out and delivery," Zomato co-founder Gaurav Gupta wrote in a blog post. Pro members will get access to exclusive delivery offers, which will now be over and above any deals available to other Zomato users.
They will also get priority delivery on Zomato. This means that any order placed by a Pro member will jump to the front of the real-time queue.
"This will lead to your orders getting delivered 15-20 per cent faster (on an average) than what you experience right now during peak dinner times," Gupta said. Zomato said if Pro members do not "save 2x the subscription fee of Zomato Pro within the subscription period, we will auto-refund your subscription fee at the end of the year, no questions asked!"
"This money back guarantee will be applicable to all Zomato Pro/Gold memberships bought or renewed today onwards," Gupta said.
"The restaurant industry is struggling during the Covid-19 crisis, and we hope that Zomato Pro can be one of the most important levers to drive growth, and help restaurant businesses cover up the losses incurred in the last few months," he said.
Zomato last year became one of the targets of a #Logout campaign initiated by some restaurants for allegedly facilitating discount addiction among customers through its Gold subscription programme.
