Delivery Fees & The Neighborhood Restaurant

Musing on this: Are you changing your takeout habits because of the massive spike in delivery fees?

Noticed it again last night when ordering from New Ginger Root on 1st Ave. & E. 64th St., a basic neighborhood joint we wanted try because it’s vegan. Its website links to 9 separate delivery options - from DoorDash to Grubhub to UberEats to Qmenu, etc. etc. Many of them declare themselves “no fee,” but when you get to the end of ordering and press the penultimate button, you discover that they all tack on a fee of $6 to $13 (!). This is in addition to an upcharge of $2-$3 per item versus their current published menu.

I’m of many minds about this. On the one hand, I’d like to believe the money is going to the (universally immigrant) laborers who are eking out a living with this hard work. On the other hand, I’m pretty sure the bulk of these service fees are going to Silicon Valley tech consolidators. My politics aside, this addition of $10-$20 for basic takeout orders is absolutely changing our takeout habits: We’re doing it a lot less, and cooking more… which is probably a very good thing.

Except I wonder if these basic neighborhood restaurants are going to suffer from Silicon Valley-generated inflation?

[EDIT: I’m enjoying - and expected - the judginess. After all, this sub is about opinions! But for the young’uns and newcomers to our fair city, let me point you in the direction of one of the greatest essays ever written about New York, appropriately titled “Here Is New York,” written by E.B. White in 1949. https://cpb-us-w2.wpmucdn.com/campuspress.yale.edu/dist/b/3011/files/2018/08/Here-is-NY_EB-White1-yk0d8g.pdf

Key passage: “Each neighborhood is virtually self-sufficient. Usually it is no more than two or three blocks long and a couple of blocks wide. Each area is a city within a city within a city.”

You can still judge me - I can walk it off. But this is a great read, regardless.]