An analysis of Chef'd and its competing site, HelloFresh for popularity and traffic factors.

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Vilune Sestokaite
Professor Lamer
Intro. To Web Publishing
25 January 2018
Chef’d Popularity & Traffic Analysis
WEB SITE OVERVIEW
 General Company Information: According to LinkedIn, Chef’d is a food and beverage
company with 201-500 employees that specializes in meal kit delivery, whose mission
statement is creating food that makes “special memories, nurtures the soul, and brings
people closer together.” Chef’d is based in California and was created in 2015 in order to
help households eliminate food waste by pre portioning healthy meals. One can order
these meals online or grab them from any of the participating grocery retailers. Kyle
Ransford, the CEO of Chef’d, further explains, “We see ourselves as more of an online
meal store–we’re the only service that gives customers the ability to order what they
want, when they want it, without the hassle of a subscription or membership fees.”
The Chef’d website creates a simple process where the consumer shops for meals
online, is shipped the ingredients in a signature box, and then cooks the content in a box.
The service does not have any sort of subscription fee, is customized for every consumer
with a quiz that provides possible meal options, and provides quality meals from the
chefs who created them. With Chef’d, one can also create a weekly meal plan and receive
discounts.

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Chef’d has partnered with seemingly endless companies such as: Allrecipes,
American Diabetes Association, Atkins, Ayara Thai, Beyond Meat, Bicycling, Prunes
from California, Campbell’s Kichen, Casa Vega, among 45 others. By collaborating with
other companies, Chef’d can better advertise and allows them to better place their foot in
the door of other endeavors. Not only has Chef’d partnered with other companies, but
with over 50 chefs as well who create the recipes delivered to the consumers home.
Chef’d has their own blog, SmallBytes, that contains recipes, tips and tricks for a
well-balanced lifestyle, the best places to dine, updates on new restaurants and upcoming
people in the culinary world, and a how-to on hosting dinner parties. Alongside the blog,
Chef’d has created their own magazine that was published online in summer of 2017. The
magazine contains interviews with famous chefs, highlights ingredients of the season,
contains recipes, 10-minute meals and meals that children can make, partners with
beverage companies to match a drink to a Chef’d meal. Chef’d is gaining momentum as
they have been featured in well-known magazine such as: Glam, CNBC, Forbes, Fortune,
People, and Women’s Health just to name a few.
One can even become a food critic of Chef’d. According to the website, “As a
Food Critic, you’ll share your opinions on the latest Chef’d meals while contributing your
favorite tips, foods, and products through a series of engaging pieces of content.” After
becoming a food critic, one can get the latest deals and promotions, while expressing
one’s love for Chef’d. There are
three different levels to be a critic
and are shown in the picture to the
right.

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Chef’d is just getting started with their business moves. Ransford comments,
“We’re adding more than 30 new recipes a month with new partnerships from
chefs…Our new app will make it even easier for customers to order – they can pick any
Chef’d recipe and in only four clicks, have two meals on their way.”
 Product & Content Analysis: One of the main features of Chef’d is the total
personalization. One option is to take a quiz that will provide the consumer with possible
meal choices they may
enjoy. I took the quiz
myself to learn a bit
more about the
questionnaire.
The picture above represents the first question of the quiz. The following questions were:
2) What type of meals are you looking for? Lighter, Trending, Family Friendly,
or Classic
3) How many people are you cooking for? 1-2, 3-4, or more than 4
4) Which of these cooking experiences are you most interested in? Getting
healthy, date night, entertainment, cooking with kids, learning new skills, or
global cuisine.
The quiz was simple and took less than thirty seconds to take, but to receive the
results, one has to input their email and name to receive the recommendations.

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If one does not want
to take the quiz, then the
second option is to browse
through all meals, which can
be sorted by best sellers,
price, or new arrivals.
Search filters are also available alongside this. One can filter by the type of meal
(breakfast, lunch, dinner, dessert), the cooking time ( <10 min, 10-20, 20-45, 45-60, and
60+), protein (beef, chicken, lamb, pork, turkey, veggie, shellfish, fish, duck), cuisine
(there are 17 options from American to Japanese), skill level, food category, dietary
lifestyle, allergens, and spice level. There are hundreds of meals ranging from $9 to $189.
All of the options that Chef’d offers markets different individuals with differing tastes,
lifestyles, skill levels and price points.
The third option is weekly meal planning for those who are looking for something
more long term than just a single meal. In this case, the food would be delivered
throughout the entire week to ensure quality and freshness. As with all things on Chef’d,
every meal plan is customizable and unique. There is a meal plan for people with diabetes
where Chef’d has partnered with the American Diabetes Association, one for those living
the low-carb lifestyle where the partner is Atkins, one for those who want to cook
gourmet with the help of The New York Times Cooking, one for busy college kids that are
provided quick and simple meals from Spoon University, and lastly, one for those wanted
to lose weight with Weight Watchers. As one can see, Chef’d teams up with various

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partners to appeal to each individual lifestyle. This option is the only one that requires a
weekly subscription. One is given the option to opt out by skipping the weekly order.
Lastly, Chef’d has something called Collections which is described “like playlists
for your mouth. Whether you’re planning
a family night, an adventurous date night,
or just weekday dinner and T.V. night,
we’ve got a collection for you.” There are
over 30 playlists one can click through.
The picture on the upper left shows just a few fun playlists that are available to
look through. Some others are Game Day, Date Night, Avocontrol, and Bacon Before
Everything.
 Competing Site:
Below, I have included a comparison chart of some of my observations, thinking
this would be helpful before breaking everything down.
HelloFresh is a competing website and is slightly larger in comparison to Chef’d.
According to HelloFresh’s LinkedIn, it was founded in 2011, and has 1,001-5,000
employees and specializes in “sourcing fresh and organic ingredients.” HelloFresh
believes that to make a meal, it takes “a lot of work and smart people… from Data
Scientists to DevOps Engineers, to potato farmers, and the men and women who ensure
Employees International Founded Subscription/Plan Recipes App Wine Extra Merch. Search Bar Student Discount
Chef'd 201-500 No 2015 Only weekly plans 300 Yes No No No No
HelloFresh 1,001-5,000 Yes 2011 Yes 2,500 Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

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every box is perfectly crafted for every customer… disrupting the food supply chain and
the multi-trillion-dollar food tech industry.”
Like Chef’d, HelloFresh is highlighted by major companies and websites such as:
Entrepreneur, Observer, InStyle, Buzzfeed, Business Insider, among many others,
Additionally, while HelloFresh has offices in Berlin, NYC, Sydney, Toronto,
London, Amsterdam, and the Texas, Chef’d only has offices in California and NYC. One
can see that HelloFresh appeals to the international audience, while Chef’d stays in the
United States.
While Chef’d has no
subscription, in order to receive
anything from HelloFresh, one has to
sign up for a meal plan. There are three as follows: the veggie plan (plant based protein),
classic plan (widest variety), and family plan (quick and easy). The chart to the right
compares the three plans offered, comparing cost per serving, the people that it feeds, and
the recipes that can be delivered per week. Once the plan is chosen, then the consumer
may go in and choose specific recipes. One can cancel the plan at any time, but must do
so before the cutoff each week.
One can browse the recipe archive before deciding on a plan. On HelloFresh’s
site, there is not filter like on the Chef;d site, rather a search bar and different categories
of meals such as: quick meals, most popular, easy to cook, etc. After clicking on a recipe,
both sites have a list of things that one needs from their own kitchen, the nutrition facts,
Per Serving People Recipes/Week
Veggie $9.99 2 or 4 3
Classic $9.99 2 or 4 3 or 4
Family $8.74 4 2 or 3

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cooking time, and difficulty level.
Moreover, while Chef’d only offers
the cooking instructions in the
delivered box, HelloFresh puts it up on
the website.
Because HelloFresh relies on
environmentally friendly and sustainable food, they have partnered with family owned
companies such as: Del Rey Avocado and Growers Express in California, Sea to Table in
New York, FreeBird Antibiotic Free Chicken, and Greater Omaha, while the Moneterey
Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch rates for ocean friendliness. Going along with that,
HelloFresh is also big on recycling and tells the consumer to do the same with the
HelloFresh boxes. The website even shows the consumer how to breakdown said box as
depicted by the picture to the right. While Chef’d partners are mainly food brands and
magazines, HelloFresh’s partners are more on the supplier side of things.
One unique thing HelloFresh offers is wine. One can choose from different wines
and have the 6 bottles chosen delivered to one’s doorstep (without a subscription).
HelloFresh has a wine club one can join where the consumer can choose whether they
want to explore white, red, or a mixture of white and red wines. The wine price is $89 a
month for 6 bottles. Alongside, HelloFresh can even pair the wine to the recipes one has
chosen for that week. HelloFresh also sells kitchenware, while Chef’d does not sell any
other merchandise.
One last thing I noticed is that Chef’d offers no special discounts on the website,
while HelloFresh offers 15% off for students, appealing to a wider audience.

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POPULARITY ANALYSIS
 Link Analysis
o Overview and Link Quality Assessment: Popularity, in web publishing terms, is
looking at the number of sites that link to yours and the quality of those sites. The
numbers represented in the chart above, help one to come to conclusions that deal
with link quantity. A backlink (link) is a link from another site to yours. In this
case, Chef’d has 5,900 links from another site to theirs, while HelloFresh has
about 5 times over that at about 31,800. A domain, in laments terms, is a web
address. A referring domain is a site that establishes the links. In this case, Chef’d
has 556 sites that link back 5,900 times, while HelloFresh has 2,800 sites that
have link back 31,800. When looking at the average number of links per site,
Chefd and HelloFresh are not too far apart where Chefd has 10.6 and HelloFresh
has 11.4 (each would round to 11). So, although HelloFresh has more backlinks
and sites, both HelloFresh and Chefd have almost the same number of backlinks
on each domain. Furthermore, although HelloFresh has more backlinks and
referring domains, it is important to look at the value of these websites.
o Analysis of Link Quality for Chef’d—Top Ten Referring Domains:
Total
Backlinks
No. of
Referring
Domains
Average
No. of
Backlinks
/Domain
Chefd.com 5,900 556 10.6
HelloFresh.com 31,800 2,800 11.4

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1) Atkins.com: This is a high quality link because Atkins is one of
Chef’d partners, who they have teamed up with to create low carb
recipes.
2) Runnersworld.com: This is a high quality link because Runners
World is a partner as well. Runners World is a global publication that
informs runners and with Chef’d, has teamed up to help achieve a
runner’s goal of fueling the body.
3) Sidechef.com: This is a medium quality link. Although it is not a
partner, news source, brand site, or secured domain, the website looks
reputable. SideChef is an application that shows step by step
instructions for recipes and contains how-to videos. They have
partnered with over 100 smaller food partners. They are most likely

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linked to Chefd because both site deal with “cooking on demand” and
the simplicity that comes with it.
4) Wickedstuffed.com: This is a low quality site. When I tried to visit
the site, this image
popped up. The site was
not recognizable and did
not lead anywhere.
5) Vegetariantimes.com: This is a high quality link. Although it is not a
news source or brand site, it is the web’s largest place for vegetarian
recipes and news and is a partner of Chefd.
6) Poststats.com: This is a low quality website. It is not a news source, a
brand site, or a restricted domain. In fact, when attempting to go the
website, the computer displays a white page with a warning message.
This site does not land anywhere, showing that it is a spam site.
7) Soyvay.com: This is a high quality
site because it is a partner of Chefd
as many of the sauces are used in
Chefd recipes. In fact, Chefd is
advertised on Soyway’s homepage
shown in the screenshot to the right.
8) Foodboxhq.com: This is a medium quality link. It is not a brand site,
news source, or a restricted domain, but specializes in reviewing and
rating the current food boxes, so it has some level quality. This is

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connected to Chefd because Chefd is a food box delivery company
that has been reviewed on the website and compared to other
companies.
9) Nytimes.com: This is a high quality site for multiple reasons. Not only
is it a major news source, but Chefd is partnered with the NY Times
cooking section.
10) Urlscan.io: This is a low quality link. The domain “.io” is not
restricted and can be created by anyone. This domain is for those who
are starting up websites.
TRAFFIC ANALYSIS
 Visit Analysis
o Introductions and Definitions: I got the data above by going to each site’s
Traffice Overview section on SimilarWeb. For each website, I added up the visits
from each of the six months (July 2017 to December 2017), then divided by 6 to
get the average monthly visitors. As one can see, HelloFresh has over 17 times
more visitors than Chefd. A visit is kind of like a unique visitor where it
calculates the number of people (devices) that visit a site. The number above
represents the number of people/devices that visited the website.
o Chef’d.com Traffic and Trends:
Chefd.com HelloFresh.com
Avg. Monthly Visits 156, 667 2,750,000

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As one can see, the traffic for Chef’d spikes from September 2017 to October
2017. This can be the result of the articles that were written by two news sources. One
was Fortune’s titled, “Meals in the Mail: How Blue Apron Got Started and Where It's
Heading” in September 2017 and the other was Washington Post’s, “The meal-kit
industry is at a crossroads. Will it ever figure out what we really want?” in October 2017.
Although Fortune’s does not deal directly with Chef’d, the company is advertised on that
article causing more visits. And although Washington’s Post article is not necessarily
positive, they listed many meal kit services on the website and compared them. This, then
prompted internet users to go to the meal kit websites and do research. Moreover, the
increase from November to December can be explained by Chef’d ability to deliver
specific meal kits for Thanksgiving.
o HelloFresh.com Traffic and Trends:

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HelloFresh’s traffic spikes up a little from August 2017 to September 2017, then
gradually decreases. HelloFresh released 20-minute meals in September, which could
explain potential reason for the spike from August 2017 to September 2017. The
company had something new to add, and the public got excited about it. While
September to October offers a little dip, there is a larger decline from the coming
months. In November of 2017, HelloFresh “priced its initial public offering in Europe
Wednesday afternoon” (Bary). An article written in November 2017 by Barron’s
titled, “As HelloFresh Goes Public, Meal-Kits Cool Off” describes the decline of
meal kits as a market. Moreover, HelloFresh may be in decline due to the fact that it
has been around longer than many other meal kit services. HelloFresh was established
in 2011, Chef’d in 2015, Blue Apron in 2012, and Plated in 2012 just to name a few.
Consumers get bored with one thing and want the next best thing.
o Comparisons: Traffic wise, Chef’d is more sporadic where there is a decrease
from July to September, an incline from September to October, a decrease from
October to November, and then another increase from November to December.
Contrast that with HelloFresh, where the traffic decreased from July to

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September, increased September to October, and then has been on a slow decrease
ever since.
HelloFresh, although declining, has more traffic than Chef’d for many reasons.
First, HelloFresh delivers to an international audience, so naturally, more devices
will be used to access the site. HelloFresh also offers extra things to purchase like
wine and cookware for the kitchen that could bring in a wider audience.
Moreover, HelloFresh has thousands of recipes and more variety compared to
Chef’d which has only hundreds.
ENGAGEMENT ANALYSIS
o Introduction and Definitions: The data above includes three metrics to measure
how successful a website is. The bounce rate, shown as a percentage, represents
visitors that only visited the page once before exiting the site. The web average
lies at about 40%, where retail sites are 20-40% and content sites are 40-60%.
Chefd and Hellofresh lie somewhere in the middle. The page views per visit is the
amount of pages the visitor looks at before leaving the site. The web average is
4.6, while Chefd lies a little below, and HelloFresh lies almost two points higher
than the average. The average visit duration is how much time one spends on a
site. The web average is 3.1 minutes, while Chefd lies right at the average and
HelloFresh is a hair above the average.
Chefd.com HelloFresh.com
Web
Averages
Bounce Rate % 27.60% 33.30% 40%
Page Views Per Visit 4.1 6.1 4.6
Average Visit Duration 3.15 minutes 3.3 minutes 3.1 minutes

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o Chefd.com Engagement Data: Chefd.com falls below the web averages for the
first two metrics—bounce rate percentage and page views per visit—and stands
right at the average for the third metric—average visit duration. All three metrics
are lower than HelloFresh’s metrics. Although HelloFresh has a higher bounce
rate (more pages are being visited once and then left), Chefd has a lower pages
views per visit and average visit duration. In comparison to the web averages,
Chefd averages are good for the site, but in comparison to HelloFresh, two out of
the three metrics are bad for the site.
Chefd may have a lower bounce rate than HelloFresh because of the simple
landing page that may not provide consumers with all the information they need,
forcing them to visit other pages to obtain this information. The first thing the
consumer sees when landing on Chefd’s page is the image below.

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At a glance, the landing page does not give any specific information. When
scrolling down, there is a section that gives three reasons as to why one should
subscribe to Chefd, a couple of featured meals, and some celebrity chefs that
created the recipes. Although this is information about the company, there is no
specific information about the product like the services offered, the pricing, how it
works, etc. Naturally, this would cause the consumer to stay on the website and
looks for more specific information that would help them make a decision.
Another reason they may have a lower bounce rate is because the landing page is
much simpler in terms of wording and the amount of information provided. It’s
much easier to get through and process, unlike HelloFresh’s.
One reason Chefd’s duration and page views are lower could be because there is a
filter for the recipes and only hundreds of recipes compared to the thousands that
HelloFresh has. Because there are fewer recipes and specific filters, finding what
one needs is easier in Chefd, resulting in less time. In addition, there is a quick 5
question quiz the consumer can take that will provide them with recipes, resulting
in lower time spent on looking for what they need.
Chefd has quite a simple process for ordering a meal kit which would explain why
there is less time and page views on the site. To shop, one simply can find the
recipe or kit that they like with the filters provided, then add it to their cart and
purchase without any hassle. Below shows a little bit of the simple process.

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Within the actual recipe, just the ingredients, nutrition facts, cooking level, and
allergens are offered in a bulleted list style that aids the reader in getting through
the information faster.
o HelloFresh.com Engagement Data: In comparison to Chefd, HelloFresh has a
higher bounce rate, more page views per visit, and more time spent on the site.
Compared to the web averages, HelloFresh has a lower bounce rate than the
average, and higher page views and duration.
HelloFresh may have a higher bounce rate than Chefd because HelloFresh’s
landing page has more information. The user gets more than they need from
HelloFresh’s site, causing them to bounce. Below is a couple of screenshot
showing the specific and valuable information one sees on the landing page.

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The site, just with scrolling, includes information about how the process works,
the things included in each box, the weekly menu for each of the three available
plans, and tweets from people who have utilized HelloFresh. This is more than
enough information for the consumer to decide what action they want to take.
Moreover, HelloFresh could have a higher bounce rate because although good
information about the service and company is provided, all that information might
be too much for the landing page for a consumer to handle.
One factor that could cause a higher time on the website is because there is a
search bar under the recipes section. Searching for a recipe, rather than filtering it
out, will take more time. Moreover, HelloFresh has thousands of recipes to look
at. Combining these two factors: a search bar and thousands of recipes, will make
the interaction time higher, as it will take longer to sift through information.

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Another reason could be that the process to receive meals involves more steps.
The screenshot below shows the three different plans one can choose from.
Because a subscription is required, one must take time to choose the plan, the recipes
per week, and the people it serves. After selecting the plan, one has to sign up for the
actual subscription and then needs to look through the thousands of recipes to choose
what they want delivered for the week.
When in the actual recipe, HelloFresh offers step-by-step instructions on how to make
the food and even suggested similar recipes at the bottom of the page that can add on
to a visiting time. Each recipe also contains reviews that the consumers written,
pulling the visitor in for some more reading.

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As mentioned earlier in the paper, HelloFresh offers wine and silverware for sale. If a
consumer sees this and is interested they may take the extra time and page clicks to
look at what the extra merchandise offers.
Comparison: Both Chefd and HelloFresh’s bounce rate lies below the web average.
Chefd’s is lower than HelloFresh’s because of the lack of information on the landing
page and the simpler wording, while HelloFresh’s bounce rate may be higher due to
the consumer already getting the information they need, or, in some cases,
information overload on the landing page. Chefd’s page views per visit and average
visit duration are due to many variables such as: the filter for recipes, lack of reviews
and step by step instructions, and how simple the process of ordering a meal kit is. On
the other hand, HelloFresh’s pages views per visit and average visit duration are
higher due to factors such as: the search bar, inclusion of reviews and step by step
instructions for recipes, and the process of subscription. Overall, HelloFresh has more
engagement. It engages the consumers with the product itself with the step-by-step
instructions, with other consumers with the reviews, and the content with the plethora
if information available.

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Works Cited
Bary, Emily. “As HelloFresh Goes Public, Meal-Kits Cool Off.” Barron’s Next. November 1,
2017. Retreived January 21, 2018 from https://www.barrons.com/articles/hellofresh-ipo-
blue-apron-earnings-retention-1509564598.
Chef’d. (n.d.) LinkedIn [Profile Page]. Retrieved January 15, 2018, from
https://www.linkedin.com/company/chef%27d.
HelloFresh. (n.d.) LinkedIn [Profile Page]. Retreived January 16, 2018, from
https://www.linkedin.com/company/hellofresh/.
“Interview: Kyle Ransford, Chef’d.” Culintro. October 9, 2018. Retrieved January 21, 2018 from
https://culintro.com/blog/interview-kyle-ransford-chefd/.