The Samra family owns Teriyaki Madness and Little Caesars. When they contemplated the difficulties of doing business during the lockdown, they decided to take the bull by the horns and formulate their own delivery business.

“We noticed the month the pandemic hit that it was starting two weeks ahead of us, so we were predicting if it would come here, too,” said business owner Gurpreet Samra.

“We were not sure if we would have to completely shut down,” Gurpreet said. “We were thinking of alternative ideas. We got the drive-through open at Teriyaki Madness so we would have that working. We needed to start a delivery, too.”

The new business, Delivery Boys, started with just delivering food from Teriyaki Madness and Little Caesars, but it has grown tremendously since then.

Sierra Java and Odeh’s soon came on board, and other restaurants have followed.

“They took the order in store and then they would give us a text message,” said Sim Samra. “We would go pick up the order and take it to the customer. We did that for a solid three months until we could get a system down so we could have everything online centrally located. We have an app now.”

People can go to the Delivery Boys website and download an Apple or Android app for their phones.

The business now has a dispatcher and about 15 drivers. The Samras are currently looking for more drivers.

“Our team (of restaurants) is growing every other week, too,” Sim said. “Currently we have 31, but we might have 35 to 40 by the end of next week.”

“We also have alcohol delivery,” Gurpreet said. “We are the only delivery service that can do this because we have the license.”

“The average Delivery Boy order is about 20 to 35 minutes,” Sim said.

The time may very per restaurant and according to where the delivery will be made. The business currently serves Elko, Spring Creek, South Fork and as far east as Ryndon. Soon they will be adding Carlin.

“It starts up at $4.99 for the delivery fee and there is a $2 service (fee per order),” Sim said.

“Our whole motto is ‘We are a locally based delivery service that wants to bring the convenience of a city to our local community’,” Sim said.

“It’s a convenience,” Gurpreet said.

The owners have been talking about starting this type of service for a number of years, but the pandemic made the move essential.

Restaurants can use the delivery service by going to the website and filling out a restaurant partner application.

“We bring customers to the businesses versus the businesses supplying the customers,” Gurpreet said. “We market the restaurants.”

“We take care of the logistics so you can just do your business,” Sim said.

The business will soon be offering delivery of essential products like water, milk, diapers, baby food, toilet paper and wipes. People can log on and have these items delivered directly to their homes or workplace.

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Elko-area businesses react to coronavirus: