Catering

Workplace orders driving restaurants' incremental revenue

Photo: Adobe

May 5, 2025

The market for workplace food is expanding as businesses order restaurant food and introduce employee meal programs, sometimes as a cafeteria replacement, according to data released Monday by EzCater, a food tech platform for workplaces in the U.S. The findings, based on ezCater order data and survey insights from over 2,300 workplace food stakeholders, revealed that 43% of organizations surveyed had a recurring meal program in place, up 17% from 2024.

"Workplace catering has always been a big opportunity for restaurants, but now it's bigger than ever," CMO Cindy Klein Roche said in a company press release. "Organizations are ordering for more occasions and bringing in food from local restaurants on a programmatic, recurring basis. Restaurants have a tremendous opportunity to tap into new revenue streams by embracing the evolving role of food in the workplace."

Additional ezCater survey insights on the workplace food opportunity include:

• 70% of employees who tried a restaurant through an employer-provided meal personally ordered from that restaurant outside of work, a 49% increase compared to last year.
• 60% of orderers planned to spend more on workplace food in 2025, with nearly one-third expecting budget increases of 25% or more. This is reflected in ezCater's orders as well, with average order value up 12% to $420, and average headcount up 9% to 25.
• Employees saved on average 30 minutes of their workday when meals were provided and 68% reported feeling more productive.

"Business catering has proven to be a powerful engine for growth, allowing us to connect with a significant number of new customers we might not otherwise reach," Sara Kear, CMO of Condado Tacos, said in the release. "It now represents a substantial portion of our overall catering sales volume and has become an invaluable vehicle for expanding our reach."

In today's competitive restaurant landscape, brands with established catering programs have a clear advantage. The survey found that restaurants with catering programs experienced a 5.1% increase in overall revenue from 2023 to 2024, outpacing the 3.3% average revenue growth rate for restaurants and bars reported by Technomic..

Methodology

The 2025 "Feeding the Workplace" report is based on surveys conducted in January, 2025 with over 2,300 participants, including 604 corporate catering orderers, 669 restaurant operators, and 1,042 employees. Proprietary ezCater data gathered from millions of transactions across thousands of restaurant partners was also analyzed.