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1. Introduction
In the last few years, several innovations and new technologies have affected the food and beverage sector (Bresciani, 2017) and players' strategies (Bresciani et al., 2016; Vrontis et al., 2016). In particular, advancements in food delivery services are changing consumers' food-buying habits. Online food delivery (OFD) is an innovative way to purchase food (Cho et al., 2019). This innovative technology unites the customers' social and personal needs. In the last few years OFD has become more widespread (Alalwan, 2020). OFD occurs via “platform(s) allowing customers to purchase a wide range of products or services online or from physical brick-and-mortar stores” (Cho et al., 2019, p. 108). These platforms, such as Just Eat, Uber Eats and Glovo, allow users to buy food from several different restaurants through an app or a website.
OFD platforms are usually managed by independent companies that take orders from users, communicate with restaurants and carry out the food delivery activities using gig workers (Pigatto et al., 2017). They may become an opportunity for restaurants to increase their revenues (Alalwan, 2020), and for users as they help them in choosing from several, different, food retailers (Cho et al., 2019).
In Italy, during 2019, food delivery revenues grew 56%, reaching 566m euros and becoming the foremost segment in the food sector (Politecnico di Milano, 2019). Today, 93% of major Italian cities are served by OFD, compared to only 74% in 2017, and about one in two inhabitants (47%) can order ready meals online (in 2017, only 31% had this ability). During the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, food delivery spending has increased even more in several countries (Hobbs, 2020), including Italy (Ansa, 2020). Moreover, according to the FIPE (2020), 40% of food retailers have experienced an increase in food delivery requests.
In the last few years, several studies have investigated the main driver of OFD usage (Pigatto et al., 2017; Yeo et al., 2017; Cho et al., 2019). Some scholars have focussed on the characteristics of mobile apps (Pigatto et al., 2017; Cho et al., 2019), while others have used generic behavioural models (Hansen et al., 2004; Alagoz and Hekimoglu, 2012). However, only a few studies have investigated the...