Homerunners Review
Review: HomeRunners food delivery
Jenny Booth reviews the new, concierge-style delivery service which handpicks its flowers, fruit and veg is a vast improvement on home delivery by supermarkets
Perfect raspberries, lusciously sweet satsumas and the tastiest strawberries I’ve had all year suggest that it is possible to rely on someone else to choose your fruit – something I’d always had my doubts about before.
Commercial pilots Daniel Jealous and Frankie Fraser set up their HomeRunners business in January, to offer same-day delivery of basic household essentials like washing up liquid and razors, store cupboard staples such as pasta and flour, and a range of fresh foods including bread, butter, cheese and eggs.
Their target market was busy working people in Southwest London who might not have time to shop. At first, business was moderate – then Covid-19 struck, and the two airline entrepreneurs saw demand for home delivery taking off.
The Service
I put the service to the test by ordering a range of dry and chilled goods, plus one of their signature fruit boxes. HomeRunners doesn’t offer meat, because as a small, new business their storage space is limited and they do not have refrigerated vans.
The ordering process was simple, with a sensibly small range of products from well-known and trusted brands on a clear and easy-to-use website.
Two things make HomeRunners particularly attractive – its flat rate delivery charge of £4.99, and its promise to deliver the same day if you order before noon. In the event, I ordered at 10am and by 1.30pm was taking delivery of my goods, packed in recyclable brown paper carrier bags. Social distancing was properly observed.
I was impressed to see that Daniel and Frankie had flour in stock, as the shelves remain empty at my local supermarket, so my 1.5kg bag of Marriage’s Plain Flour duly arrived along with Napolina spaghetti, Heinz tomato soup and Cushelle loo roll.
Doorstep delivery
Pride of place on the doorstep was the fruit box, glowing with colours. It contained a large pineapple, a mango, punnets of red plums, green grapes, strawberries and raspberries, at least 10 satsumas, four Royal Gala apples, four pears, four bananas and five oranges. The fruit comes from Covent Garden Market traders, and at £15 the box it was excellent value. Everything I tried was top quality and at the perfect stage of ripeness to either eat now or keep for a couple of days.
Local Independent Business
Based in the Richmond area, Daniel and Frankie try to keep sustainability to the fore, using electric cars and bikes for their deliveries where possible. Their delivery zone currently includes Kingston, Twickenham, Wandsworth, Barnes and Putney, plus most of Earlsfield and Wimbledon, and the business is looking to expand its area.
