Punter Kurt Milne made his biggest impact in four seasons as a University of Hawaii football player when he was just a freshman. He had his best game in a 2003 victory over Alabama and was named the Western Athletic Conference Special Teams Player of the Week.
Milne was an early bloomer in the world of business, too. He and partner David Farmer, a UH teammate, were ahead of the game in restaurant delivery with the service Aloha 2 Go. Hawaii Business Magazine honored them as the state’s Young Entrepreneurs of the Year in 2016 and they eventually sold their company to the national delivery service Bite Squad.
“Every year was our best year from 2010 to 2016,” Milne said in a telephone interview last week.
Farmer has since moved to Montana. Milne is still here, and still in business.
His current venture is Grindz to Go, which facilitates takeout ordering for customers at 50 Oahu restaurants, after debuting in July with just 15. He said it services 100 customers a day.
“There are no fees or cost to the customer, and the menu prices are exactly the same as if you’d ordered from the restaurant,” Milne said.
Grindz is not a delivery service; customers pick up their orders, or arrange delivery directly from the restaurant. Grindz offers the advantage of one-stop shopping, letting diners go to one site to compare restaurant menus, or order from several at once.
Restaurants pay Grindz a 9% commission on orders, Milne said. There are no other charges, and Grindz absorbs credit card fees.
Especially with in-restaurant dining suspended, takeout has been on the rise. “And people are tipping like crazy now. The average tip per order is 11%,” Milne said. “So, in theory, our service costs nothing to the restaurant.”
Before the pandemic, Milne, through another of his companies, Restaurant Marketing Hawaii, was selling services that included food photography and developing restaurants’ internet presence.Restaurant Marketing is the parent company of Grindz, and those consulting services are now available to Grindz clients.
“If you don’t have a website we’ll build you one,” Milne said.
Milne sees takeout continuing to be a strong part of the restaurant balance, and says restaurants have more control over their level of service if they don’t rely on others to deliver their food.
Looking forward, he expects that ordering platforms like Grindz will fit in well with restaurants that ramp up to make their own deliveries. “If I owned a restaurant, I would do it. There’s a lot of efficiency when you’re a restaurant delivering your own food.”
In 2009, Milne and Farmer were dealing with the effects of the recession. While selling yellow-page directories on Hawaii island they came across a guy trying to make a go of food delivery there. Back on Oahu, they looked into it. An existing business, Room Service in Paradise, was focused on visitors; Milne and Farmer were sure they could go beyond that.
“We felt like we could do it for a flat rate and with better technology,” Milne said. “We got started with one of us handling the orders and the other driving, and it snowballed from there.”
Farmer, his former partner, said their history in sports strengthened their effort. “Being teammates, we had similar work ethics and mindsets. I think it was the key to our success.”
When they sold Aloha 2 Go to Bite Squad in 2017 they took compensation in stock shares, betting on exactly what came to pass: In 2019, rival delivery service Waitr acquired Bite Squad, resulting in big paydays for Milne and Farmer.
“In every down economy there are opportunities,” Milne said. “You just have to adapt.”
