UberEATS

[dulse]

I'm surprised to see this landing page was built with Squarespace. I would have figured a tech company as large as Uber would have an easy way to throw together an email collection page without using a 3rd party.

It shows how good these kinds of tools are getting that even for an Uber the best way to build an MVP website is to use a tool like Squarespace vs. spin it up using their existing expertise (and, excitingly, the same tool is equally available to everyone).

[jasonbarone]

I've heard it directly from the people that work at these large companies. The reality is Squarespace (and other platforms like it) offer a user experience that's perfect for the non-technical people who actually manage these websites, and the entire infrastructure is effectively outsourced for $20/mo, which is insane.

[tptacek]

Even for engineers, it's good to be given explicit "permission" to use services like Squarespace rather than wasting time rolling your own crappy version of same. I have better things to do.

[meerita]

They need to rollout fast. Any kind of landing page can be successful. Once this is enough proof they can tinker an in-house one.

[andreasklinger]

i think it has mainly to do with cross department allocation of resources

in many larger companies (not saying it's like this) cross department work just increases overhead unnecessary - compared to a project team that just throughs something together quickly

[matthew-wegner]

The "Don't see your city?" form is actually just Google Forms, too.

[toddmorey]

So it's interesting. These appear to be pre-made items (limited selection each day). As far as I can tell, it's only $3 per delivery, no matter how many items you order. And the listed prices look competitive, though I couldn't find a restaurant that had any of the Uber items on the actual menu. I'm assuming they are custom specials.

I've used and liked Favor, but once you add in a tip, and pay their percentage, it can get expensive quick ($5 per, plus 5% plus 20% or so for tip). So that can be $7.50 in delivery charges for a $10 sandwich. The upside is that anything can be ordered custom.

Does anyone know the logistics? For example, are the drivers stocked with inventory in their cars to avoid returning often to the restaurant? Do food delivery drivers ever also pick up passengers?

[mmanfrin]

Ike's Menage-a-trois is $12.21 on menu, which is actually $1.21 more than Uber (although comes with chips, so that evens out).

As far as logistics, I would bet dollars to dimes there are drivers with a large stock of all/many of the items; having them return to a restaurant ad hoc for each order would make this financially unworkable. Sprig, Bento, and Rocketspoon all work this way -- drivers are simply given a next destination to go to and dish out in-car inventory.

[eric_h]

In NYC, all the uber eats "drivers" are either on bikes or on foot. They usually have a hot storage bag and a cold storage one, and they're stocked with all the items available for the daily menu. Pretty good experience, generally, though I've found the caviar fast bite experience to be generally better (it's exactly the same idea as Uber eats, they partner with many of the same restaurants, same delivery model).

[swozey]

The Austin menu is really strange. Gordoughs, our famous blow-your-gut Donut burger place has one item available and it's not even a burger. It's a tiny dessert item. I use Favor, Eat24, etc all the time. If the menu is this minimal I doubt I'll ever use uberEATS.

[donjh]

I'm redirected to the UberEATS Chicago page, which has been around for some time. Did UberEATS launch in new locations today?

[tswartz]

Not sure if these are new cities, but these are listed on the page:

Austin, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, Toronto, Barcelona

[fosk]

A bad day for Postmates, Munchery or Doordash. Uber really has a huge infrastructure and they could easily undercut them, push them out of the market, and then raise prices a-la Amazon Books.

[serve_yay]

Postmates seems to feature bicycles in a weirdly prominent way, as if that is the best way to deliver a meal. But then they offer delivery from places that are so far away that cycling would be impractical from a delivery standpoint. Anyway, this space seems to still be up for grabs, but then I don't live in a place like NYC where Seamless owns it.

[acconrad]

This was inevitable. I wonder what this means for a company like Instacart? Acquisition? Push them out?

[dzlobin]

Instacart delivers groceries that you buy through the app/web.

This is a service where couriers equipped with the dishes of the day ride around and deliver the pre-packed meals you order.

[fosk]

I would be more worried if I was Postmates, Munchery or Doordash. Instacart provides a substantial different service: raw grocery delivery instead of pre-made food.

[bernardom]

Favor has been doing pretty well here in Boston, though I believe they use multi-modal transportation (bike, scooter, motorbike, or car).

I wonder whether that's enough to make them operationally superior vs. uberx drivers?

[Thriptic]

I'm in Boston (well, Cambridge to be precise) and am not familiar with Favor. How does it differ from Grubhub, Foodler et al?

[mayneack]

We've had this in LA for quite some time. It works pretty well. I haven't had any problems with food that seemed too old since they're driving around with it already in the car.

[bkeroack]

Uber Eats is great. You can get delivery food in 5-10 min instead of 30-45 min (at least in LA). Its usually faster than walking down the street to the closest lunch place.

[27182818284]

How old is this? I've already seen job posting with Uber for people to work with UberEATS, so I figured it was around or privately around maybe?

[larrys]

Failing to see at $3 delivery charge how anyone can afford to do these deliveries with wear and tear on a car and so on.

[devy]

It's actually $4 flat fee for delivery, tips included.

[wehadfun]

Actually makes total since. Really they should do all local deliveries.

[seliopou]

Shout out to CrunchButton[0] who have been doing curated, location-based food delivery since 2012-ish.

[0]: https://crunchbutton.com/

[slayed0]

Oh good, more cars blocking traffic in SF with their hazards on for justification.

[tptacek]

If Uber's delivery fleet is taking advantage of cars already on the road serving passengers, then this is a net reduction in traffic: food delivery is already a thing whether or not Uber provides it.

Meanwhile: apparently a lot of these orders are delivered by bike messengers.

[davexunit]

Please do not use this service. Uber is a very unethical company that does not treat their drivers (the ones doing all of the work) well.

[t0mbstone]

I don't see how this is possibly true. Every single time I ride in an Uber or Uber X, I always ask the drivers how they like driving for Uber, and what their experience has been like, and every single one of them has responded positively (out of around 20 times I've asked).

If they don't like how they are treated, they can stop driving for Uber. It's not my moral responsibility to police Uber's business practices for the sake of their drivers.

[johndevor]

It would behoove you to suggest a practical alternative, instead of just condemning their existence.

[teej]

[ citation needed ]