SAN FRANCISCO — All Day Kitchens, which operates ghost kitchens in the Bay Area and Chicago, has scored a $65 million Series C financing round led by Lightspeed with participation from GIC, and Alex Taussig joining the board as Director and Jeremy Kranz as Board Observer. Existing investors Andreessen Horowitz, Founders Fund, Khosla Ventures, and Base10 also participated in the round, and new investors include real estate firm, Tishman Speyer, Lime CEO, Wayne Ting, and Forward co-founders, Adrian Aoun and Ilya Abyzov. The company has raised $102.5 million to date and will use the proceeds to expand to new markets, R&D and hiring.
All Day Kitchens’ mission is to empower restaurants to thrive in the digital ordering and delivery era. Unlike the traditional warehouse ghost kitchen model, the company offers restaurants access to a full network of strategically located satellite kitchens to quickly multiply their customer reach without upfront investments associated with opening a brick-and-mortar location. Their micro-fulfillment model not only offers a plug-and-play solution for restaurants to rapidly scale their digital business but also brings great restaurants closer to consumers.
With over 15 locations operating throughout the Bay Area and Chicago, the number of restaurant partners on the platform has grown 4X in the last 12 months. All Day Kitchens has partnered with beloved local brands such as Honey Butter Fried Chicken, Mott St, HaiSous, 90 Miles Cafe, Cheesie’s, China Live, Dosa, and Mac ‘n Cue by International Smoke from Michael Mina and Ayesha Curry.
“After six months on All Day Kitchens, it’s clear this concept is the future of the industry,” said Darnell Johnson, owner of Chicago’s Home of Chicken & Waffles. “The partnership has been an unbelievable way to expand our brand reach and take us to another financial level. The volume of guests coming in who discovered us through an All Day Kitchens location keeps growing.”
“All Day deeply understands the pains that restaurants face scaling their businesses in a delivery-first world. They have invented the most elegant solution to this wide-spread problem and are well on their way to becoming the leader in infrastructure for food delivery” said Alex Taussig, Partner at Lightspeed. “We couldn’t be more delighted to lead their round and help support restaurants around the country.”
“COVID has been challenging for businesses, especially in the restaurant industry. We’ve seen increasing urgency from restaurants to expand digitally, for pick up and delivery, using All Day Kitchens. We’re scaling rapidly in new markets to help more great brands thrive” said All Day Kitchens CEO and co-founder Ken Chong. All Day Kitchens has doubled the number of satellite kitchens in its network this year and plans to accelerate opening new locations.
With the new round of funding, All Day Kitchens is hiring rapidly for its headquarters, and opening several new markets across the US. Their next market launches will be in Texas and Southern California, where they’ve already received high inbound interest from top regional brands.
