Why we started Laayo in Birtamod and Damak

Ask people in Birtamod where to get the best momo and you will get five different answers, each delivered with total confidence. Ask them how to order it to their door on a rainy evening, and until recently the answer was: call the shop, describe your house by the nearest landmark, and hope.

Laayo exists because we think people in smaller towns deserve the same convenience people in big cities take for granted, built for the way their town actually works.

Why start small#

The usual playbook for a delivery app is to launch in the biggest city, where there are the most restaurants and the most people with smartphones, and spread outwards later. We understand why. But it leaves towns like ours at the end of a very long queue, and when the apps finally arrive, they arrive built for somewhere else.

We started in Birtamod, and then Damak, for a few reasons:

• It is home. We know the roads, the lunch rush, the lanes that turn to mud in monsoon and the shops that close early on festival days. That knowledge does not fit in a spreadsheet, but it shapes every decision.
• Distances are short. Most deliveries in our towns are a couple of kilometres. Food can arrive hot, and a rider can do more trips in a shift.
• Restaurants are ready. Local kitchens make excellent food and many have loyal regulars, but very few had a way to reach people beyond their phone line and their front door.
• People are ready too. Smartphones and digital payments have become everyday tools in our towns. The demand was there. The service was not.

What delivery looks like here#

Building for a smaller town changes the details in ways you only learn by doing it.

Addresses are landmarks. Many homes do not have a street address anyone would use. People say “behind the school, the blue gate, second lane after the temple”. So in the Laayo app you drop a pin exactly on your home, and your rider can call you if the lane is hard to find. We are also building a way for riders to ask you to share your live location when they are close.

Lunch is the big moment. A large share of our orders come in the middle of the day: offices, shops and schools all ordering at once. That is when kitchens are busiest and every rider is on the road. A lot of our engineering work, from delivery time estimates to how orders are offered to riders, is about getting lunch right.

Weather is real. Monsoon rain can turn a ten minute ride into a twenty minute one. Our delivery estimates take rain into account, so customers see a realistic time instead of an optimistic one.

Cash still matters, and so does E-Payment. Plenty of people still prefer to pay cash at the door, and that is fine. But more and more people pay by E-Payment: scanning a QR code, using their mobile wallet or bank app, or topping up a Laayo Wallet. We have worked to make every one of those feel like one tap, including tipping your rider from the tracking screen.

The people who make it work#

Laayo is three groups of people working together, and we are only as good as the weakest link.

Riders#

Our riders are the face of Laayo. They know every shortcut in town. We have built the rider app around their day: clear order alerts that are hard to miss, a run planner when they carry more than one order, a record of every tip they receive, and a typed reason when they need to cancel so we hear what really happened on the road. We keep working on the things riders tell us matter most, including fair, predictable pay and less time waiting at restaurant counters.

Restaurants and shops#

Our partner restaurants range from small family momo shops to busy cafes. When a restaurant joins Laayo, it tells us its preparation time, opening hours, who on the team should receive calls, and how it wants to be paid, either by bank or by QR. Restaurants manage their menu and their orders from the Laayo partner app, and get paid on a regular schedule with a full statement.

Beyond food, Laayo also delivers groceries and everyday items from local shops, so a forgotten packet of milk does not need its own trip.

Customers#

And then there is you. People in our towns are generous with feedback, sometimes very loudly, and we are grateful for it. The things you tell us most often are exactly the things we are working on hardest.

What we are working on#

We would rather be honest about where we can do better than pretend everything is perfect.

• Faster deliveries. The biggest delay in most orders is not the ride. It is the time food waits at the restaurant for a rider to arrive. We are working on how riders are matched and when orders are offered, so food leaves the kitchen sooner and arrives hot.
• Food that arrives the way it left. Cold food, spilled curries and missing items hurt more than a late order. We are working with partner restaurants on packaging and order checks, and we read every low rating.
• Payments that just work. E-Payment should never leave you unsure whether you paid. We are making payment status clearer and tightening every step where a payment can get stuck.
• Support that answers quickly. When something goes wrong, you should reach a real person fast. We are making it quicker to get from the in-app help to someone who can fix it.

What comes next#

Our focus for now is clear: make Laayo genuinely excellent in Birtamod and Damak. A great service in two towns is worth more than an average one in ten.

Looking further ahead, we are preparing to bring Laayo to Kathmandu, with early 2027 as our current plan. It is a plan, not a promise, and we will only launch when we are confident we can deliver the same care there that we try to give here. When we have a date, you will hear it first on this blog.

Until then, thank you for ordering, for riding, for cooking, and for telling us what to fix. Laayo is a small team building something big for small towns, and every order is a vote of confidence we do not take lightly.