Lightning Delivery shuts down

SBJ file photo

Jason Green started Lightning Delivery nine years ago, but he says competition has increased dramatically.

Springfield-based Lightning Delivery, a food delivery service that started in 2010, has shuttered.

A May 29 post on the company’s Facebook page announced the closure, citing an inability to compete with the multiple other delivery services in town. There are at least four national chains operating in the Queen City.

Jason Green started the company nine years ago when only one other food delivery service, QuikDine.com LLC, was in operation locally. QuikDine closed Jan. 4, according to past Springfield Business Journal reporting. QuikDine owner Randy Ruggieri said increased competition in the local market also was his reason for shutting down the business started in 2000.

Uber Eats, DoorDash, GrubHub, Postmates Inc. and Cape Girardeau-based carGO Technologies LLC, which launched in April in the Queen City, now are among food delivery companies doing business in Springfield.

Attempts to reach Green for comment about the closure were unsuccessful. The company website links back to the Facebook page and the phone number is no longer in service.

Green told SBJ in January that Flash Delivery LLC, dba Lightning Delivery, had over 20 restaurants in Springfield, Nixa and Ozark as partners under contract. In a 2016 SBJ interview, Green estimated the company processed around $1.4 million in food orders and grossed $250,000 in revenue during 2015. He said in January that revenue for 2018 was around $125,000.

“At the end of the day, we’re not doing this to get rich,” Green told SBJ in January. “We put food on our table by putting food on other people’s tables.”