A Nigerian food business known as Corporate Ewa has accused global food delivery platform, Glovo, of impersonating her restaurant on its platform and misleading customers by delivering food allegedly sourced from roadside vendors under her brand name, allegations that Glovo has not publicly responded to.
The accusations were made in a video shared on Instagram, where the vendor claimed that Glovo created and verified accounts in her business name without her authorisation, resulting in reputational damage, customer complaints, and what she described as serious food safety concerns.
In the video, the vendor said she began receiving complaints from customers more than a year ago, claiming they had ordered food from her restaurant via Glovo and were dissatisfied with the quality.
“Everytime, we get customers messaging us that they ordered food from us on Glovo and the food was bad,” she said in the Instagram post. “We were always getting messages but we’ve never been on Glovo.”
What You Need to Know
Corporate Ewa said she later discovered that a business account bearing her restaurant’s name, menu, and images had been created on the Glovo app without her consent.
After contacting Glovo to report the issue, she said the company informed her that the business account had been “verified” and was legitimate, a response she disputes.
According to the vendor, the problem extended beyond a single fake account.
She said that after continued customer complaints, she rechecked the platform and found multiple accounts using her restaurant’s name and branding.
Claims of Food Sourced from Roadside Vendors
In an attempt to understand what was happening, the vendor said she placed an order herself through one of the impersonating accounts.
She claims the food was delivered and, through questioning the rider, she traced the source of the food to a roadside food seller in the Ojuelegba area of Lagos.
According to her account, the delivery rider told her that Glovo allegedly directs riders to collect food from informal roadside vendors and then sells it under branded restaurant listings.
The vendor said she later contacted Glovo formally through her lawyer but received no substantive response.
“They said they were working on it,” she said, “but nothing has been resolved.”
She said Glovo informed her that the complaint had been reviewed and the listing removed, but subsequent checks on the app showed the accounts were still active, continuing to use her brand’s name and images.
Techparley has contacted Glovo via email requesting comment on these allegations. But as of the time of publication, Glovo has not responded.
Broader Implications
If substantiated, food experts say the allegations raise significant concerns about the robustness of merchant verification processes on food delivery platforms, particularly how businesses are authenticated, monitored, and protected against impersonation.
Analysts say the claims also bring consumer protection and food safety into focus, especially in an environment where digital platforms increasingly mediate food access for urban populations.
According to industry leaders, this raises broader questions about regulatory oversight in Nigeria’s fast-growing digital commerce sector and whether existing frameworks adequately protect both businesses and consumers.
Talking Points
It is concerning that a food delivery platform as large as Glovo could allegedly allow merchant impersonation to persist, raising serious questions about the strength of its verification and monitoring systems.
The fact that a business owner claims her brand identity, images, and menu were used without consent suggests potential gaps in platform governance that could expose both consumers and legitimate businesses to harm.
At Techparley, we see this as part of a broader challenge in Africa’s platform economy, where rapid digital growth has outpaced regulatory frameworks and accountability mechanisms.
The situation also highlights how deeply consumers now rely on digital intermediaries for everyday services like food, which makes transparency around sourcing, safety standards, and merchant legitimacy more important than ever.
However, this is also an opportunity for platforms to strengthen trust by improving verification processes, responding faster to complaints, and working more closely with regulators and industry bodies.
If addressed properly, cases like this could push the ecosystem toward higher standards of accountability, better consumer protection, and a more sustainable relationship between digital platforms and small businesses.
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