How to Develop an On-demand Alcohol Delivery App like Drizly?

Updated on Dec 15th, 2023

COVID-19 has caused a significant shift of preference from brick and mortar stores to online sellers. With a growing number of customers joining the platforms each day, businesses are also switching to online mode to stay competitive. 

The alcohol industry is not behind adapting to this new normal. Studies show that the on-demand alcohol delivery industry is expected to reach $1,684 billion by 2025 at a CAGR of 2% over the forecast period. The exponential growth has attracted huge investment in terms of time and financial resources, bringing business owners fast returns. 

Drizly is one of the leading solutions in this arena, giving inspiration to multiple investors. If you too are one of them, we have got you some help in the form of this blog that walks you through stages of the mobile/ web development process while creating a full-fledged business plan. 

Let’s begin!

How to Build An On-demand Alcohol Delivery App Like Drizly?

Step 1: Know What Is Drizly

Drizly is a leading alcohol eCommerce solution that connects alcohol consumers to sellers with the help of a mobile app and website. Currently, the app has more than 3000 liquor stores registered all over from the USA and Canada offering the widest range of spirits and alcohols. 

Since its inception in 2013, the company has seen tremendous growth and managed to become a market leader in the on-demand alcohol delivery arena. Although the company doesn’t handle the delivery, Drizly’s popularity has attracted a lot of customers to join the platform. 

Key Features that Drizly Boasts of Include:

  • Largest Selection of Wines: With thousands of sellers, Drizly offers thousands of beers, wines & spirits by shopping at multiple liquor stores at once.
  • Compare Price: Make informed choices by comparing prices of alcohol from liquor stores in your area. 
  • 1-Hour Delivery: Alcohol delivery in under 60 minutes
  • Shipping: Even though you don’t live in a Drizly city, the company offers 2-3 day alcohol shipping across the states of CA, CO, CT, FL, IL, MA, MN, MO, NJ, NY, NC, OR & WA.
  • Secure Payment: Pay with your credit card on the app and verify the purchase with ID upon delivery or pickup.
  • Customer Support: Have questions about beer, wine, and spirits available in your area? Get answers from your customer support team. 

Step 2: Understand What Makes Drizly So Popular

Seamless functionality centered around the user’s preferences is what keeps Drizly winning the game. Some of these parameters that contribute to its success include:

  • Ease of Use: Drizly offers a simple and easy-to-navigate interface that allows customers to look for beverages. Customers can easily filter their choices, the brands they prefer, and pricing options. 
  • Knowledge of Customer Preferences: Drizly closely looks and analyses user preferences, and makes sure to include those learning to improve the experience. 
  • Widest Range of Liquor: With over 2000 listed products, the platform offers customers extensive choices. Because Drizly does not add additional costs to these products, the alcohol is also provided at the best prices.
  • Reach: Operating on more than 100 markets across the USA and Canada, Drizly has a great user base in multiple markets.
  • Smooth In-app Experience: With easy-to-navigate UI/ UX, Drizly offers a great in-app experience to each user category. 
  • Quality of Store Owners: It is extremely important to make sure that the sellers in your alcohol delivery business are providing the best products. Drizly makes sure of this with the help of its quality check process. This is done before a store is able to join the platform. 

Step 3: Analyse How Will Liquor App Like Drizly Work

Unlike most of the on-demand eCommerce solutions, Drizly neither sells its own alcohol nor has its own fleet. It just redirects the traffic to customers’ nearest stores and lets them take it ahead. Simply put, it is more like an advertiser for sellers. Drizly’s business model focuses on offering an exclusive and extensive range of alcohol at affordable prices. In order to facilitate smooth operations, Drizly follows the following steps:

  • Customer signs in to the app and orders beverages from a liquor store near him.
  • The order is directed to the store that takes care of the delivery and ensures that the order is fulfilled before an hour. 
  • Customers can track the order via the app.

Drizly acts as an intermediary between the customer and sellers. Thanks to the cutting-edge technology and streamlined functionality, users are increasingly registering on the app bringing more opportunities to the sellers. Although sellers take care of the delivery on their own, Drizly gives them reasons to stay on the app with attractive benefits. 

Before adding the stores to the platform, Drizly conducts a quality check on them to ensure standards are maintained along with certain parameters like product storage, pricing, distribution system, etc. Once done, store owners can register to the app after paying the registration and monthly charges, integrating their delivery system with the app. The liquor store’s POS system is also integrated, making sure inventory is updated to the app.

Step 4: Understand What is the Revenue Model of On-demand Alcohol Delivery App Like Drizly

Drizly’s main source of earning revenue is through its liquor store partners. The app charges a monthly fee from its partner stores. This fee ranges between $100 to $10,000 and depends on various factors including area, delivery value, affordability, etc. Additionally, Drizly doesn’t ask its partner stores to pay a margin from individual sales. In this way, Drizly manages to stay out of the actual alcohol delivery but still manages to offer unbeatable features.

When it comes to the customers, Drizly charges a delivery fee of $5 which is directly given to the liquor store. The app doesn’t add any additional charges to the price of the alcohol, and the prices listed are the ones decided by the store. In addition to this, Drizly also has its age verification framework that can be offered to other companies for monetization purposes. 

Step 5: Identity Must-Have Features to Consider During Alcohol Delivery App Development

Customer App Features

  1. Online Order Requesting

Customers can locate a nearby store and choose from the available choices of beverages with just a few taps on their smartphone. 

  1. Convenient Delivery Scheduling

Want delivery at another time? Feel free to use the app and schedule the delivery at your convenience. Either choose instant delivery or set a date and time for delivery. 

       3.Real-Time Order Tracking

Track your order in real-time with smart Google Map integration that brings you updated data on your screen. 

  1. Notifications

Receive notifications about new offers, discounts and deals, and order status without even opening the app.

  1. Multiple Payment Options

Choose between COD, Credit Card/ debit cards, net banking, wallets, and more to securely pay for your order.

  1. Referral Programs

Leverage referral deals by bringing your friends to the app using this feature.

  1. Rating & Feedback System

Like or dislike the experience? Leave feedback for the app team to get back to you and incorporate changes.

  1. Product Search Filter

Customers can easily browse a variety of wine collections with the help of product search filters. These can sort the collection by brand, price, type, etc. in the wine, beer, and whisky delivery app.

Delivery Agent App

  1. Order Status Updation

Once the order is successfully delivered, delivery agents can receive a digital signature from customers via the delivery agent app. They can also update the order status from pending to delivered.

  1. Profile Management

Delivery agents can view and update the profile on the app and check customer feedback as a part of it to stay motivated. 

  1. Shortest Route Tracking

With in-app google map integration, delivery agents can move from the shortest and collision-free routes to deliver alcohol on-time.

Store Manager App

  1. Product and Cost Management

Store managers can add/ update the liquor from drinks delivery app catalog depending on the availability. They can also modify the price, category, and subcategory of specific items. 

  1. Real-Time Order Tracking

Store managers can track delivery agents to know their exact location and push for on-time delivery to ensure customer satisfaction. 

  1. Send Notifications

Managers can send notifications to the customers to let them know about the current discounts, new products, and deals and more with this.

  1. Reports

Get detailed analytics about your store’s performance including complete business sales and expenses reports with a single click on the app.

  1. Stock Management

A store manager can add new liquor products to the inventory with their prices after calculating the profit margin. The app will notify managers when a specific product will reach the nearby shortage limit.

Admin App

  1. Store Management

An admin can run and manage multiple liquor stores with this single panel. He/she can maintain records of all the stores serving under the alcohol On Demand platform.

  1. Cost Management

Admins can add or update liquor products in the app catalog after defining prices, categories, and availability status.

  1. Customer Management

Admins can check all the customers associated with the app and monitor their activities to help them with their needs and give them personalized offers through PUSH notification marketing campaigns.

  1. Delivery Agent Tracking

Admins can track each order in real-time to check the delivery agent’s credibility and vendor service quality with the live-location tracking feature.

  1. Multiple Payment Options

Admins can accept payments from multiple payment processing channels such as net-banking, credit/debit cards, CODs, Mobile Wallets, and other country-oriented gateways.

  1. Analytics

An admin can use the real-time dashboard to get a complete analytics report that can show weekly, monthly, quarterly, and annual ROI using attractive graphics.

Step 6: Figure Out the Platform: Web/ iOS/ Android App Development

Once you have done a comprehensive analysis, figure out the platform that would serve the best for your customers. The popular choices include:

  • iOS app development
  • Android app development
  • Web development
  • Cross-platform app development

Step 7: Hire Mobile/ Web App Development Company

While you always have a choice of going for freelance developers, it is a wise option to go for a mobile app development company because they:

  • Hold more experience
  • Have an extensive skillset
  • Focus on quality
  • Can be caught anytime you need
  • Offer flexible hiring models
  • Bring on superb project management to the table
  • Enable you to track the project status

And much more. 

Step 8: Finalize the Cost of Developing an On-demand Alcohol Delivery App

The cost to build an app like Drizly depends on multiple factors including:

  • Platform 
  • Features and their complexity
  • Team size and expertise
  • Number of users and their categories

And much more. Make sure you understand each of these aspects well to bargain the best cost. In case of a budget crunch, you can always go for MVP development and expand as you progress.

Develop app like drizly

Ready to Begin with On-demand Alcohol Delivery App Development?

Get in touch with experts at Matellio. Having a team full of certified professionals, we bring you best-in-class services backed by our web developers, mobile app developers, business analysts, QA and testing engineers, UI/ UX experts, or anyone you need for a smoother development process. Offering flexible payment options, enterprises regardless of their size can choose to hire the teams at their convenience and preferences. Over 500+ brands across the globe have trusted us for our exceptional services. To know more, reach out to us right away.

Disclaimer: Please note that the content of this blog including links, texts, images, and graphics is only meant for informational purposes. We do not intend to infringe any copyright policy or do not possess any third-party material. If you have issues related to any of our content or images, kindly drop your message at info@matellio.com 

Enquire now

Give us a call or fill in the form below and we will contact you. We endeavor to answer all inquiries within 24 hours on business days.