Saudi chicken brand Al Baik launches deliveries in Dubai

It’s a brand that is as famous for its crispy chicken as it is for its serpentine queues. And now fans of Al Baik in Dubai no longer have to wait in line for a taste.

The Saudi fast food brand has launched a delivery service with Talabat.

While delivery was initially restricted to areas close to the brand's Dubai Mall branch, a representative for Talabat told The National delivery will extend to 29 areas across Dubai from Monday.

The areas that will be covered include Downtown Dubai, Business Bay, Dubai Design District, Al Qouz 1, 2 and 3, Al Safa, Jumeirah 1, 2 and 3, Al Wasl, DWTC, DIFC, Al Satwa, Karama, Al Bada’a, Zabeel 1 and 2, Al Jaddaf, Dubai Healthcare City, Umm Hurrair 1 and 2, Oud Metha, Mankhool, Al Jaffiliya, Al Hamriya, Al Mina, Al Hudaiba and Al Raffa.

There is a minimum order amount of Dh10, and a Dh5 delivery charge. Al Baik will be active and open on the Talabat app for customers daily from 10am to 10:45 pm.

Some of the bestselling dishes for delivery are the chicken nuggets meal, Double Baik burger, Al Baik chicken meal and chicken fillet sandwich.

Fans of the brand can also order the famous Al Baik shawarma, Big Baik sandwich, shrimp meals and falafel sandwiches.

An Al Baik nugget meal. Photo: Janice Rodrigues

The wait time for the meals seems to be approximately 40 minutes.

Since the launch, it’s already received a four-star rating on Talabat. A representative of the company said one customer ordered ten of every main menu item when it became available on the app.

Al Baik opened its first UAE branch in The Dubai Mall in June. The 355-square-metre fast food joint is almost always packed and often has huge queues, which is also the case at Al Baik’s Expo 2020 Dubai venue, which opened in October.

The first Al Baik outpost opened in Jeddah in 1974, and Dubai was its third pit stop in the Middle East after two branches in Bahrain in 2020.

Considering its huge success, it’s no surprise that expansion across the UAE is in the works, with future plans to operate “across the seven emirates”.

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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.

Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.

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Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.

From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.

Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.

BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.

Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.

Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.

“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.

“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.

“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”

The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”

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