Field Notes
The fifteen-minute promise, and the city that has to keep it
We rebuilt our dispatch map around one number — and Medellín's couriers taught us why the number was never the point.
Last winter I spent two weeks riding behind couriers in Laureles, timing every order against the little countdown that riders see on their phone. The promise on the splash screen says fifteen minutes. The street, it turns out, has its own opinion — a closed corner, a slow elevator, a doorman who wants to chat.
The number was a story we told ourselves
When we shipped the original dispatch logic in 2017, fifteen minutes was a bet, not a measurement. We assumed the fastest route was the right route. But Andrés, who has delivered in El Poblado for six years, kept beating our estimates by ignoring them — he knew which buildings buzz you up before you knock.
"The app gives me the map. The neighborhood gives me the shortcut."