In a few week’s time I will be packing myself off to hospital and I’ve been thinking about whether Preoday could make the experience any more comfortable. At first I wasn’t sure – it’s not like I can pre-order intravenous pain relief! But then, as I’ve started to read various blogs about packing your hospital bag, I’ve realised that it could be very useful indeed.
No matter how prepared you are as a person, there’s bound to be a couple of items forgotten in the mad hospital rush. And yes, I could send my husband out to roam the hospital corridors and find me the most sugary snack in the hospital food hall, but I’d much rather he stuck it out by my side. Why should be get a break from the agony after all?!
So I’m thinking, how great would be it be for patients, like I will be, to be able to pre-order items to be delivered (excuse the pun) to my room for when I arrive and over the following few hours? Pretty darn great, I can tell you.
I’m sure the doctors and nurses would love to be able to order themselves a healthy meal to the ward. That way they wouldn’t end up skipping meals or eating sandwiches and chocolates because they don’t have time to spare walking to, queuing and eating at the hospital canteen.
On the morning after the night before (or the night after the morning), assuming the main event has passed, the same hospital food ordering service would be great for the patients, and for the pennies. I’ve been there before, you get your ‘menu’ up front, then a trolley comes around and you pick the food you want. If the server has run out of something, they’ll have to go back to the makeshift canteen to stock up. Now, imagine the menu was digital and customers placed their order via a screen or app – it would speed up the whole process and reduce waste by ensuring staff have the right quantities of the right meals available.
For situations like the above, Preoday seems a natural fit. Now if only I could choose a delivery time for this baby, that would make life easier still. But for once, I don’t think there’s an app for that.
It’s not as catchy as: ‘When is a door not a door?’ (answer, when it’s a jar) but it speaks to the idea that in-car collection, and the technologies that support it, are flexible enough to bend to the needs of a business and its guests.
Delivery can be daunting to the uninitiated, and it might be tempting to sign up with a third-party ordering aggregator that offers the service, such as UberEats, but other options could suit your business and brand better. Here we present three different ‘levels’ of delivery, starting with the most basic – and cheapest method: doing it yourself.
