Wolt Israel GM: "We are entering a new era of competition in the catering budgeting market"
Tomer Cohen, General Manager of Wolt Israel, announced at Calcalist's HR In Motion conference in collaboration with Wolt Benefits the launch of a catering budgeting solution for employees, which will compete with the veteran players in the market, 10bis and Cibus.
“The last decade of my life, and the companies I have led, brought me to this exact moment. About ten years ago, I founded my first company, JOBIT, which focused on career management for Generations Y and Z. After a few years, I had the privilege of serving as CEO of BUYME for about five years,” said Tomer Cohen, General Manager of Wolt Israel, as he opened his remarks at Calcalist’s HR in Motion conference, held in collaboration with Wolt Benefits.
“When I was thinking about what I wanted to say today, a story came to mind from my time at BUYME, a story about innovation, specifically innovation in people management. It’s the story of Riki’s safe,” he said.
“Riki works at a fairly large company and is responsible for employee holiday gifts. For years, she distributed gifts using a traditional coupon booklet. She kept it locked in a safe, and before every holiday she would take it out, tear off the vouchers, and hand them out to employees. That was the routine. Afterward, the vouchers would often end up in the wash or misplaced in various ways. Not so long ago, just 15 years back, this was the standard. Then new technology arrived, bringing innovation that completely transformed the industry.”
According to Cohen, “This innovation did two things: it created significant value for both companies and employees relative to the budgets invested, and it reminded us of the importance of not remaining stagnant, of not clinging to outdated practices that no longer make sense but continue simply out of habit.”
Cohen said that whenever Wolt enters a new competitive field, the company asks itself whether the customer is truly at the center of the solution being offered. “Are customers fully maximizing the budgets they choose to invest? That’s the question we asked when we entered Israel in 2018 and changed the way people receive deliveries at home. We started with restaurants and expanded into retail and other categories.”
He continued: “We also ask ourselves whether the customer is truly at the center of Israel’s employee meal budget market today. Our answer is no. There are deeply rooted norms that, when viewed objectively, don’t make much sense. For example, being required to order lunch by a specific time in the morning, often together with colleagues. Or having to present a numeric code every time you go to a restaurant to redeem a meal benefit. These practices reflect a kind of stagnation that has developed over years, and it’s stagnation we believe needs to change. That’s exactly what we intend to do.”
Cohen added that Wolt Israel, which is part of the American corporation DoorDash, was selected to lead the global launch of the company’s employee meal budget solution.
“We are very proud to be an innovative country,” he said. “There are many HR leaders here who are building innovative organizations in forward-thinking ways, and we are proud that Israel was chosen to lead this global launch.”
