If you order food from Ubereats, be careful of this trickery lol

[Captante]

I've been noticing more "ghost kitchen" restaurants on ubereats and doordash lately. Went to order some italian over the weekend and there was a new one "Maggiano's Italian Classics". Maggiano's is a chain that's pretty well known and has a good menu, but this doordash restaurant didn't carry any of the same things and only had about 20 menu items. As far as I could tell, this was no physical location, just some offshoot digital kitchen. Maybe eventually I'd be OK with ordering from a place like that, but I much prefer being able to order from a known physical space with many reviews.

Any new listing that pops up on any of the delivery app's should be immediately suspect. I have fallen prey to the "trendy chicken sammich thats actually Fridays" on Seamless myself and it sucks.


What exactly IS a "Ghost Kitchen"?

 

[Stiff Clamp]

What is the point of setting up a virtual brand as an alias to make food deliveries?
Experimentation with product names? Price experiments? Avoid sullying your established brand with delivery complaints? Grab business from people avoiding your known brand?

Smells like deceit.

 

[nakedfrog]

What is the point of setting up a virtual brand as an alias to make food deliveries?
Experimentation with product names? Price experiments? Avoid sullying your established brand with delivery complaints? Grab business from people avoiding your known brand?

Smells like deceit.

People like to try new things/places, that would be my guess.
And people that would not intentionally order a burger from Denny's (who I agree makes a decent burger) wouldn't automatically turn their nose up at The Burger Den.

Is it really "deceit" when you can go to various restaurants to get the same Sysco food?

 

[Lost_in_the_HTTP]

What is the point of setting up a virtual brand as an alias to make food deliveries?

In the wonderful world of web widgets, you may be shopping a marketplace/auction type site. You find a widget you like for $25.00 and buy it. Seller is listed at Bob's Widgets in Winonka.

When you get the widget, it's in a Home Depot box. You look it up on their site and find it for $15.00 with free shipping.

What happened? AFTER you placed the order with Bob, he went to HD and placed an order using your address to ship to. Bob paid the $15 and pocketed the extra $10.

Could that be happening here? Is 'Burger Den' really Bob sitting on his couch in his den in his skivvies? You place an order with the Burger Den, but Bob then places an order at Denny's for a $6 burger and keeps the rest?

 

[BoomerD]

It's disappointing when restaurants try to mislead customers like that. They're all about transparency and serving up delicious food without any tricks or gimmicks. It's a relief to find places you can trust in the sea of options out there. Thanks for sharing your friend's experience - it's a good reminder to always double-check before ordering!

And THANK YOU for bumping such an informative 3 1/2 year old thread before it faded into obscurity. What would we do without folks like you?

 

[Zeze]

I realized ive never used a third party delivery app.. prob because I know I'll pay double.

 

[MinervaLaw]

Also, we only use DoorDash, if we really really need to. But, there are all these restaurants we have never heard of. Did some research and realized these fake places are just regular restaurants using a different name and making burgers or whatever. Doing more research, it turns out all these places are fake! Not the real main restaurants, but anything you've never heard of, most likely it's fake. My wife coined the term "Ghost Restaurants". because they aren't real and made up to make money from innocent people.

Also, at least for DoorDash, I only have used it because I get a free membership from my Chase Sapphire reserve card, but compare the prices vs. the real menu. They have a significant up-charge. Sure, I get "free" delivery, but the food cost soooo much more that they make their money one way or another.

 

[Red Squirrel]

I've pretty much cut down on using delivery services now to maybe 1-2 per month at most. It's crazy just how expensive it's gotten. A meal that would cost maybe $15 if I went in person to get it will end up close to $40 going through these services, by the time you add up all the fees, tip, etc.

 

[BoomerD]

I've never used one of these delivery services...the closest is having a pizza or chinese food delivered by the restaurant.

 

[MinervaLaw]

I've pretty much cut down on using delivery services now to maybe 1-2 per month at most. It's crazy just how expensive it's gotten. A meal that would cost maybe $15 if I went in person to get it will end up close to $40 going through these services, by the time you add up all the fees, tip, etc.

Exactly. That's why we try to avoid them. We cook at home mostly or go out on dates or family meals, but DoorDash is crazy expensive when you look at the cost of a meal at a restaurant vs. the whole delivery deal. I know they need to make money and I don't hold it against them, but jeeze, it's a little outrageous.

 

[deadlyapp]

Exactly. That's why we try to avoid them. We cook at home mostly or go out on dates or family meals, but DoorDash is crazy expensive when you look at the cost of a meal at a restaurant vs. the whole delivery deal. I know they need to make money and I don't hold it against them, but jeeze, it's a little outrageous.

I hear this a lot but honestly it's about break even for me.

I tip about 18% but there's no delivery fee, the service fee is only a few dollars generally, and more often than not I'm saving because I'm not going to order any drinks (I'll just have what I have at home).

I usually am getting dinners for three at ~$55 as long as we don't go crazy on appetizers. This is a good sit down scratch food local place.

 

[Torn Mind]

IHOP does this with Pardon My Cheesesteak.

 

[WelshBloke]

What is the point of setting up a virtual brand as an alias to make food deliveries?
Experimentation with product names? Price experiments? Avoid sullying your established brand with delivery complaints? Grab business from people avoiding your known brand?

Smells like deceit.

Because when someone searches for "Burger" on the app instead of just having one result in the search you have the top 15!

 

[WelshBloke]

WTF? How is that not outright fraud? I would sue for that bullshit.

What exactly is fraud there? You searched for, and ordered, a burger. They delivered a burger.

 

[sdifox]

What exactly is fraud there? You searched for, and ordered, a burger. They delivered a burger.

Necro thread. Margarita Nuts has been MIA since last November.

 

[MinervaLaw]

I hear this a lot but honestly it's about break even for me.

I tip about 18% but there's no delivery fee, the service fee is only a few dollars generally, and more often than not I'm saving because I'm not going to order any drinks (I'll just have what I have at home).

I usually am getting dinners for three at ~$55 as long as we don't go crazy on appetizers. This is a good sit down scratch food local place.

As I mentioned, I still use it sparingly, because I'm lazy? LOL. But do look at the pricing vs. the restaurant. It can get ridiculous as they charge almost double on some items. I never worry about the delivery price/service fee since It's free to me, but I do tip and those drivers deserve it. I have noticed though, that i send way more on DoorDash vs. the same restaurant.

Heck, I've spent almost $100 from a sushi restaurant and not bat an eye, but I still see the problem how DD manipulates the cost of the food to off-set the "free" delivery and such. It's just annoying, but I still participate sometimes, lol. It's the ease of doing business.

 

[MinervaLaw]

Necro thread. Margarita Nuts has been MIA since last November.

LOL, I never looked and had no clue this was a nerco thread from 2021.

 

[Torn Mind]

I understand how easy it is to keep ordering. Colorful pictures of food. Can't see bank account. Throw in some emotional distress.

Real easy to lose money, get fat, and get cancer down the line.

I literally ordered four items in 24 hours at about 20 dollars an order. 80 bucks down the toilet and I'm itching for more, some French Toast.

 

[Captante]

LOL, I never looked and had no clue this was a nerco thread from 2021.

Necro-post plus strong chance of the near-inevitable (& only very slightly!) improved "forum posting bot" ??

Couldn't possibly be a live human new-ish member.... could they/it ?!?


EDIT: As a reminder .... the "easy to pick off" 'bots are NOT the issue ... it's when you genuinely can't tell the difference that we have a problem. *(and it's CLOSE)

 

[Lost_in_the_HTTP]

^^^ I've noticed this same member bumping quite a lot of old threads, often with nearly irrelevant posts. Seems very spam-bot-ish, but so far I haven't found any of the expected embedded links.

 

[Torn Mind]

Having developed a weird fascination with sampling french toast, I have come to the conclusion that Java Nation is the only local restaurant so far that actually puts enough batter into the bread such that it gets to the center.

The other restaurants are essentially marking up things so far, it might as well be just paying their rent and workers.

IHOP - big pieces, not too burnt. Center indicates that it's just white bread.
Ted's bulletin - one side had no batter, and was charred, making it taste bad.
Local "Olde Towne" - the most bare of the bunch, essentially looks like store white bread(it was also the cheapest) with one side battered and the other bare. Essentially relies on the syrup and the customers not caring to get by.

 

[Charmonium]

I've pretty much cut down on using delivery services now to maybe 1-2 per month at most. It's crazy just how expensive it's gotten. A meal that would cost maybe $15 if I went in person to get it will end up close to $40 going through these services, by the time you add up all the fees, tip, etc.

What did the leper boy say to the prostitute?

Thanks, keep the tip.

 

[QueBert]

IHOP does this with Pardon My Cheesesteak.

That's a ghost kitchen, so it's not quiet as bad as Denny's pretending to be Burger Den. At least it's not IHOP selling IHOP shit under a different name to trick you. Denny's now has 2 different non existant restruants on UE here that sell regular Denny's shit. And possibly a 3rd grilled cheese one I found the other night. I didn't investigate to see who's behind it, but I know damn well there's not a physical restaurant around me that only sells 4 Grilled Cheeses lol.

But now that I think about it, since IHOP's making the Cheese Steaks, Pardon My Cheesesteak might as well be IHOP. But, I think they (Pardon) don't exclusively use IHOP, they'll use whatevers in the area that allows a ghost kitchen. The only way to know for sure is if the place allows pick up you can Google the address. But the places without pick up, good luck figuring out who's behind it. BWW has like 3 different made up bullshit too.

And to make things worse, and something that makes me question UE & Door Dash even more. There are a lot of places on DD/UE that have hundeds of reviews with 4+ average ratings. And Yelping the same spots they'll have a similar number of reviews and be much lower. Example:

BWW on UE - 1,210+ reviews, 4.0 stars
BWW on Yelp - 874 reviews, 2.1 stars

There's no way humanly possible the BWW by me is 4.0 average with that many reviews. It sucks, I understand some people will say it's 5, but not 1,200 people. I would be surprised if 100 people would rate it above a 3.5. The 2.1 average is believable. And I see this for almost everywhere when it's low on Yelp it's high on UE/DD.

Another example.

Del Taco by me on UE - 4.5 stars, 356 reviews
Same one on Yelp - 2.5, 85 reviews

NO FUCKING WAY it's 4.5, they can't even get an order right, ever. I don't even pay attention to the raitings on UE or DD because they're clearly pulling some bullshit to make them look good.

 

[Torn Mind]

That's a ghost kitchen, so it's not quiet as bad as Denny's pretending to be Burger Den. At least it's not IHOP selling IHOP shit under a different name to trick you. Denny's now has 2 different non existant restruants on UE here that sell regular Denny's shit. And possibly a 3rd grilled cheese one I found the other night. I didn't investigate to see who's behind it, but I know damn well there's not a physical restaurant around me that only sells 4 Grilled Cheeses lol.

But now that I think about it, since IHOP's making the Cheese Steaks, Pardon My Cheesesteak might as well be IHOP. But, I think they (Pardon) don't exclusively use IHOP, they'll use whatevers in the area that allows a ghost kitchen. The only way to know for sure is if the place allows pick up you can Google the address. But the places without pick up, good luck figuring out who's behind it. BWW has like 3 different made up bullshit too.

And to make things worse, and something that makes me question UE & Door Dash even more. There are a lot of places on DD/UE that have hundeds of reviews with 4+ average ratings. And Yelping the same spots they'll have a similar number of reviews and be much lower. Example:

BWW on UE - 1,210+ reviews, 4.0 stars
BWW on Yelp - 874 reviews, 2.1 stars

There's no way humanly possible the BWW by me is 4.0 average with that many reviews. It sucks, I understand some people will say it's 5, but not 1,200 people. I would be surprised if 100 people would rate it above a 3.5. The 2.1 average is believable. And I see this for almost everywhere when it's low on Yelp it's high on UE/DD.

Another example.

Del Taco by me on UE - 4.5 stars, 356 reviews
Same one on Yelp - 2.5, 85 reviews

NO FUCKING WAY it's 4.5, they can't even get an order right, ever. I don't even pay attention to the raitings on UE or DD because they're clearly pulling some bullshit to make them look good.

Well, ratings do depend on the buyer's.

For a "get-delivery" customer, they probably haven't surveyed the field to pick apart the "finer details" of chicken wings, they feel fine after eating the food, and that's the end of it. They do skip any and all "customer service" negative reviews because it's delivery, not waiting at a table with a waiter/waitress that could sour the experience.

Plus, people might really grade on a "curve", with the 2 and 1 stars reserved for a terrible experience while three stars might actually be the magic number for "bad food" but everything else, like timely delivery, is fine. I myself rated "Olde Towne" and "Ted's Bulletin" a three because I didn't like their French toast. I rated my IHOP French Toast a four because it was mediocre. Java Nation, I did give a five because their food just "felt right" on all points.

So the four star BWW might indeed mean the same a the 2.1 on Yelp. They make wings, they'll suffice, but people don't feel that are "above par".

 

[FelixDeCat]

This thread was delightfully entertaining to read. I've never used Uber for anything much less Doordash. But to hear people complain about paying $40 for a cold, late delivered $10 food item is funny.

People who I work with have food delivered all the time so I have witnessed this in person and I tried so hard not to laugh about the cold $40 burger.

Call me old fashioned but...