7 PM and 2 AM Are Peak Demand Times For Pizza, Study of Internet Traffic Finds (bbc.co.uk) 91
Seven o'clock in the evening is a global sweet spot for wanting to order take-away food, says an international study of internet traffic. From a report: Academics have examined patterns of looking for food online, such as pizza or Chinese meals, across the UK, US, Canada, Australia and India. They found that a similar "twin peaks" pattern appeared in all countries - at 7pm in the evening and then at 2am. The study suggests ancient "foraging" behaviour has now switched online. This big data research from biologists at the University of Aberdeen, to be published by the Royal Society, has tracked how the search for food takes place online. You can find the study here.
here's (Score:3, Funny)
your $2 million research fund and here's the PhD.
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Not to mention.. (Score:1)
TFA can't even be bothered to describe it as bimodal. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multimodal_distribution)
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Re:here's (Score:4, Informative)
Heck, anyone who's worked at a pizza delivery place knows 7PM is the peak. Most places are closed by 2AM though, even on weekends, so I'm a bit suspicious of that result.
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That is after going out has finished and people are hungry.
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Do you even live in a moderately-sized city? 1:45AM is last-call for most barflies in most states. Guess what you usually want to do after a lot of drinking come 2AM?
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Some bars in New Orleans don't even close at all.....
You just order your last drink to go, and order a pizza when you do eventually go home....etc.
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I've lived in a half-dozen large cities, and never seen a pizza place deliver past 2AM. Is this some NY/Chicago thing?
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Hey, This can revolutionize the industry.
Make sure there is adequate staffing at these hours and have the business hours extended.
I would think peak demand times for pizza would be 12:00 and 6:00. If I were to own a Pizza Shop Ill have hours of 11 am - 9 pm.
But this study with the 2:00am surge, would lead me to possibly change my model a bit.
While I wouldn't have intuitively guessed the 2:00am hearing about it makes sense. As Pizza is often the meal for when you are late (7:00PM late dinner hour) and 2:00a
Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)
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Except there's probably not enough developers for that to actually be the reason.
More like:
7pm - OK, what's for dinner?
2am - drunk and looking for something to sop it up.
Pretty much once the bars close is when you'll see the spike for pizza.
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This is exactly it and when I was in college I managed a convenience store I already knew this, no one had to research it they could have just asked the businesses. They have been keeping records of trends like this for years so they could make sure they had enough people staffed and stock ready. They already have names for these peak times Dinner and Bar Rush.
I hope no one paid for this study. On the internet doesn't change the behavior it just makes it easier which isn't an unexpected result either.
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Reminds me of a study that found that cows that were given names had better health and produced more milk. Won some kind of "stupid research" award but actually it was a quite insightful bit of research on farm animal welfare which looked at a huge number of factors, including if the farmer named their cows.
As can be seen from the summary (I know no-one reads those so I'll forgive you) this was actually a study into how ancient foraging behaviour in humans relates to the way people buy take-away food online
I order after I get home from the bart (Score:3)
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Yeah...you might as well get it out of a gas station....
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Yes, this data is valuable because you can avoid the rush and get your pizza faster, hotter and fresher. During peak delivery periods, they would have to produce several orders at once for a single delivery run and thus where you lived determined how long the pizza is sitting in the delivery vehicle. Avoiding the peak periods means the kitchen makes the
foraging behavior (Score:3)
In between we discovered, you know, agriculture and retailing. Spoiler alert!
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That is why you don't often find starved people behind their laptops, who died during foraging.
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Simpler yet. We get hungry at specific times of day. In the morning before we set out to do whatever the hell we do, whether foraging or hunting or farming or smithing or whatever job one has had through the ages. Around noon, possibly as an aid to take a break, gather your thoughts, and restore energy. And then again in the evening before dark since we're about to be unconscious for several hours and can't take a quick snack in the meantime.
I wonder about the work hours these researchers have. Do they not
2 am? (Score:1)
In my country, Pizza Hut & Dominos don't deliver after 11pm except on Friday & Saturday when deliver up 12:00. Most local shops also close by the same time.
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Get a better country. :)
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Oh. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to make fun of the locationally challenged.
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In most states of the US bars close at 2am [wikipedia.org], meaning that a large number of people suddenly have nothing going on at the same time. I'd wager that, of the things to do after the bars close, a large number of them show elevated levels of activity right after bars close, regardless of where you live, simply because of the influx of people.
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Folks reall have "time" (Score:2)
They found that a similar "twin peaks" pattern appeared in all countries - at 7pm in the evening and then at 2am.
So, of all problems this world faces, these folks find time to study this?
On the other hand, someone should tell me why this finding is relevant to Slashdot because I do not see how it is.
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Simple: Next time you pull an all-nighter binge coding, you know when NOT to order your pizza.
Here's an idea for a new study... (Score:2)
Re:Here's an idea for a new study... (Score:5, Funny)
How much do you tip?
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And as long as you keep handing them 20% for being the last one on the route, you'll remain the last one on the route. If your behaviour doesn't change based on my behaviour, there is no reason for me to change my behaviour.
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Because there is more perceived loss of time driving back empty from the customer farthest (furthest? I'm never sure about those two) from the pizza place than from the nearest. The whole trip may take the exact same time, it's all in the psychology of it.
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farthest (furthest? I'm never sure about those two)
Farther and Farthest are typically used to compare physical distance. Further is typically used to mean some variation of "additional", though it can also be used for physical distance, depending on what guide you follow.
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It is the drunks and stoners that are ORDERING the pizzas at 2am....
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Foraging behaviour. Yeah. Right. (Score:3)
This is it. Not that people get home around 7pm and dopeheads getting the munchies have few other convenient options after midnight.
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Hmm (Score:2)
I pick up a pizza for the family on the way home from work fairly often.
I don't even call, much less go online.
Sounds like this tells us about online behavior ...
The other thing that comes to mind is: isn't 7PM like, the evening meal time in many countries? How is "getting something for dinner" the same as "foraging"?
people like pizza.... (Score:2)
+10 Insightful
Pizza "pizza" (Score:3)
Duh! (Score:3)
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