I use Grubhub most of the time, and I’ve found the thing that keeps me on the platform is 1) The $10 monthly credit on American Express Gold cards and 2) The 2% cash back from the Rakuten portal, which stacks with the 4x points from the Amex card.
Of course, a lot of restaurants end up increasing their prices on Grubhub to make up for their fees, and rightly so (I phone in using the number listed on Apple Maps). I still don’t understand how anyone expects these food delivery apps to be profitable. I’m also 95-99% certain once we feel safe dining at a restaurant again we wouldn’t be using these apps anymore.
Exactly,those are amazing perks but they make for very expensive moat. As long as they need to bribe their users to stay with different financial incentives they will keep being glorified VC money redistribution schemes. My guess is that we will see a shift towards profitability when either cash dries out (which would mean Uber wins, they have deeper pockets and cashflow from ride sharing) or restaurants start to shift towards delivery optimized structures that would bring down delivery times and increase margins. I wouldn't bet on market domination from any player yet considering Just Eat's recent moves and deep pockets.
A little off topic, but wow it always amazes me how good credit card rewards are in the US.
I agree that it makes for an expensive moat. It really doesn’t seem viable to sustain a business like this.
Unless, ghost/cloud kitchens become a thing and these app platforms start building or partnering with these kitchens. Then they have full vertical integration where they can set prices.
Yeah, it’s tricky with how to find just a phone number for the business. Luckily a lot of businesses have a website (that looks like a simple Squarespace/Wix template) that list a phone number or direct you where to order online.
A lot of restaurants use Chownow, which seems great since there’s no commission paid, but you lose out on being discovered online on Grubhub/Postmates/etc.
> 1) The $10 monthly credit on American Express Gold cards
But the annual fee is $250, how is it worth it? At best if you use the $100 airline credit, which is now hard to "hack", and max out $10/mo on Grubhub, you're still paying $30 for the privilege...
Amex has customer service at least an order of magnitude better than any Visa/MC licensee I’ve dealt with; that’s really what you’re paying for. If something goes wrong with a purchase, they’ll tend to make it right without asking many questions/filling any forms. Lost cards can be next-day’s without charge. They have actual physical offices in non-US nations that can advance you local currency and provide you a new card (among other things) should your wallet be stolen while traveling.
Having utilized card services and customer support heavily for almost two decades with a number of card co’s made me very much an Amex partisan.
The only payment service I’ve had fraud trouble with is PayPal. Their customer service is the worst. I recently bought something through PayPal, and it was amazing to see how hard a fraudulent seller could take their system.
> Earn 4X Points at U.S. supermarkets on up to $25,000 per calendar year in purchases.
> Earn 4X Points on restaurants including takeout and delivery
> Book a room through American Express Travel that's part of the Hotel Collection, stay two consecutive nights and get a $100 hotel credit to spend on qualifying dining, spa, and resort activities.
I wasn't able to utilize these benefits efficiently since the The Blue Cash Everyday® Card has 3X points @ Supermarkets has no annual fee and I have another card for restaurants.
I suppose if you max out all the categories it's not a bad card if it's all you have.
Aside from what the peer comments say here, the point multipliers end up offsetting the costs of the annual fee. You’re right that the airline credit is harder to redeem now, but in my case I was luckily able to redeem it all by February.
Also, Chase Sapphire Reserve has the $60/year credit to DoorDash. Seems like we’re just redeeming a bunch of VC money.
Wow, I had no idea Chase added that perk, and I just started using DashPash this month! I switched from my Amex to the Chase card just now, you just saved me a bunch of money, thank you!
> I’m also 95-99% certain once we feel safe dining at a restaurant again we wouldn’t be using these apps anymore.
at least here in NYC, we've been using delivery apps for over a decade. I wouldn't expect usage to drop below pre-COVID numbers once (and really, we should be saying if) things go back to normal.
Of course, a lot of restaurants end up increasing their prices on Grubhub to make up for their fees, and rightly so (I phone in using the number listed on Apple Maps). I still don’t understand how anyone expects these food delivery apps to be profitable. I’m also 95-99% certain once we feel safe dining at a restaurant again we wouldn’t be using these apps anymore.