TikTok has launched TikTok Kitchen, a food delivery company that uses viral videos to create menus.
TikTok Kitchen, which will be launched in the US on March 20, 2022 is expected to let users order meals that they created using short video clips.
These include baked feta pasta, corn ribs and ‘pasta chips’ – cooked pasta shapes coated in cheese and air-fried, perfect for dipping.
TikTok Kitchen is a virtual restaurant that delivers and collects orders online.
These ‘viral” menu items are baked feta pasta and corn ribs.
However, it is unclear whether TikTok Kitchen will exist separately from the TikTok App (or as an option within) that app. The standard TikTok app allows users to make short clips for sharing with followers.
TikTok has teamed up with Virtual Dining Concepts, an Orlando, Florida based marketing firm, for the service.
Virtual Dining Concepts claims that its menu has been inspired by TikTok’s most popular food trends. “The dishes reflect food trends created by TikTok founders.
TikTok has been used more than 1,000,000 times per month by people around the world. It allows users to upload videos with recipes or other food tips and offers a platform for creators.
Virtual Dining Concepts reports that this has made the culinary space explode.
Robert Earl of Virtual Dining Concepts, British born and based in the United States, stated that TikTok’s first US location will be around 300.
There are however plans to increase this number to approximately 1,000 US locations before the end 2022.
MailOnline reached out to TikTok in order for them to comment. TikTok Kitchen is not yet available in other countries.
TikTok allows Chinese users to stream live, make short videos, music videos, and generate Gifs.
Other successful virtual restaurants – which have no bricks-and-mortar locations for letting customers dine in unlike industry giants such as McDonald’s – include WingSquad, Barstool Bites and MrBeast Burger.
Deliveroo or UberEats deliver local meals that have been prepared in shared and commercial kitchens.
Menu items on TikTok Kitchen are likely to reflect the passing nature of trends on the social media app, which regularly come and go.
If a recipe becomes popular, it is likely that it will be added to TikTok’s Kitchen menu.
TikTok is home to many bizarre and unrelated videos that gain popularity when they are viewed more often, and then become ‘viral.
Any TikTok user can create a food trend – presented in a short step-by-step video recipe, for example – that takes off and becomes famous.
Bloomberg says that names of dish-creators will not be given credit for their creations.
‘It isn’t clear how TikTok will determine the authorship of certain viral dishes, which sometimes belong to more than one person, or what revenue it expects to generate and distribute, the site reports.
However, it does plan to devote profits from TikTok Kitchen to the creators of the menu dishes and ‘support promising culinary talents’.
TechCrunch was informed by TikTok of the fact that the creators will receive credit for the dishes and “will be prominently featured throughout the partnership”.
‘Proceeds from TikTok Kitchen sales will go to both support the creators who inspired the menu item and to encourage and assist other creators to express themselves on the platform in keeping with TikTok’s mission to inspire creativity and bring joy to its users,’ TikTok said.
TikTok also clarified TikTok Kitchen is more of a campaign to bring TikTok food to fans, rather than TikTok’s venture into the restaurant business – even though that’s precisely what it is.