DISH: Meals on wheels

Darius Filon of eCoCarts outside Ollie’s.

by Nikki M. Mascali
Weekender Editor

MEALS ON WHEELS

Like in the days of yore when milkmen delivered milk right to customer’s doorsteps, eCoCarts, a free, eco-friendly transport service, wants to do the same for your lunch or dinner with its offshoot, eCoToGo.

The idea behind these two new services came from James Abrams, who co-founded EthosGen in Dallas, a company that strives to make clean, sustainable local alternative energy.

“When thinking of things the area needs, one of the ideas that came up was to provide a delivery service to restaurants that don’t have delivery,” said Pavel Petrash, eCoCarts’ director of business development. “It’s kind of like the idea of GrubHub in Philadelphia, where restaurants outsource their delivery to us.”

The company partnered up with the Ken Pollack dealership to provide eco-friendly delivery vehicles to serve the greater Wilkes-Barre area.

“We wanted to help out the restaurants in the area and give them some sort of delivery option,” Petrash said. “If they’re using delivery on their own, the cost of purchasing vehicles, hiring drivers, insurance, cell phones, etc., they can outsource it to us.”

Participating restaurants, which currently include La Tolteca, Ollie’s, Peking Chef East and The Chicken Coop, pay a monthly subscription rate. Customers, who do all their ordering online via myecocart.com, pay a $2 delivery charge in addition to the cost of food. eCoToGo has two cars and drivers and currently offers deliveries Monday-Friday from 11 a.m.-9 p.m. and Saturday from 4-9 p.m.

“Our focus is on the demographic of the working people in NEPA,” Petrash explained. “Through the (Greater Wilkes-Barre) Chamber of Commerce, we found out that there’s like 18,000 people that work currently downtown in Wilkes-Barre during the week. Our focus is providing lunch to these people that can’t go out for their half-hour or hour breaks.”

The company is working on getting more restaurants and hopes to eventually travel beyond Wilkes-Barre.

“We want to expand our online menus and provide the most food we can for the customer — obviously there might be some work in play to expand to other areas like Scranton and whatnot,” Petrash said. “Our goal right now is to provide delivery to the restaurants we already have, expand that and build up the customer base with them and take it from there.”

Petrash has found the response to eCoToGo “great.”

“Every week we’re seeing more and more orders come through. It’s been a good ride so far.”

CHOCOLATE CELEBRATION

Just in case you didn’t know, Thursday, Dec. 16 is National Chocolate Covered Anything Day. As if I needed a specific reason to have my daily chocolate fill …

YOU’VE BEEN SERVED

When it comes to eating out, I’m almost always going to choose a locally owned establishment over a chain. As the daughter of former restaurant owners who relied on diners of the same mindset, it’s kind of like paying it backward, if you will.

So when I realized that one of my staple lunch haunts had weekend hours, I excitedly hightailed there. Sadly, for the second visit in a row to said establishment, the service was less than stellar. After 15 minutes of sitting there with nary a drink offering, I went up to the counter and asked that someone be sent over to wait on us.

Yes, the food at this place is great, which is why I go there in the first place. I’ve never had a meal there that I didn’t love, but to me, food isn’t the only component to a dining-out experience. Good service is a big deal to me — I’ve seen my mother wait on a packed dining room completely on her own and not only be friendly and courteous, but make every table feel like they’re the only ones there — so I know it can be done. If a restaurant wants to offer that kind of service.

Good service should always be just as important to a restaurant owner as the freshest ingredient, especially these days, when diners can take their hard-earned money to the establishment next door, down the street or even the grocery store.

Give me bad service once, shame on you. Give me bad service twice, shame on me. There won’t be a chance for a third.