Does anyone understand DoorDash and other companies DoubleDash Strategy?

In My Humble Opinion
1

I’ve tried to ignore this issue for as long as possible. I use DoorDash. It’s the most most popular delivery/shopper Service in my small Town.

Today, I was out of Refresh Optive Eyedrops.

I used Doordash to order from Walgreens the eyedrops, Tylenol, and some Werther’s Original Caramel Hard Candy for a snack.

DoorDash offers me Double Dash.
A 2nd order without the delivery and handling fees.

Sure! A fresh cup of McDonald’s Coffee is always nice.

I knew from previous orders that Double Dash sometimes uses a 2nd Dasher.

McDonald’s is almost directly across the street from Walgreens. You can stand in the Walgreens parking lot and wave at people eating in McDonald’s.

I texted my Walgreens Dasher while she was still shopping in the store.

She texted back that she hadn’t been given my 2nd order. Apparently the Dashers are offered orders to pick up. They can’t take the
initiative and ask for one from the Queue.

I felt bad when the 2nd Dasher arrived holding my cup of coffee. I’d tipped only $3 because I’d already tipped my Walgreens Dasher $8.

I used the DoorDash App to increase the Tip after the Coffee Dasher left.

I don’t under the business model for Double Dashing? DoorDash is offering me a 2nd order at a significant discount.

Isn’t it in DoorDash’s best interests to do this efficiently and consolidate orders with one Dasher?

I don’t mind receiving two totally separate deliveries.

I feel terrible for the underpaid delivery drivers

The Walgreens Driver could have received two tips from me. I tipped $8 for shopping in the store and the delivery. Another $3 for coffee makes $11 for 30 minutes work.

Instead a 2nd driver was inconvenienced with a special trip to McDonald’s for a $2.50 cup of coffee. Obviously a large tip isn’t expected on such a small order.

I probably won’t use Double Dash again.
Exploiting a person trying to earn a living makes me sad.

Here is an explanation of the promotional offer.

2

I have never used DoorDash (or any other delivery service), but as you describe it, it sounds to me that the strategy is intended to make you want to use DoorDash more. And they couldn’t give two shits about their Dashers in the process.

3

Huh, I’ve never taken them up on the Double Dash offer, but like you I always assumed both orders would would be given to the same Dasher.

Since that’s not the case, my guess is that it’s a strategy to get you to make an impulse buy that you wouldn’t have otherwise made, which seems to have worked.

4

Delivery does encourage us to buy more.

Today’s adventure started with my empty bottle of eye drops.

I didn’t want to order only one item. I added a couple more things. Score one for Walgreens.

A steaming-hot, cup of coffee sounded very good.

Cha-ching, we have a Double Dasher order.

5

I don’t use DoorDash. I have used various delivery services, but not them and not recently.

Is there any requirement to “redeem” your double dash immediately? Or is it in effect just a coupon good for a fee waiver on your next purchase any time in the next e.g. month?

6

DoubleDash offer expires in 10 minutes IIRC

It’s only available for a few businesses and those change on different days.

I’ve wondered if the businesses :thinking: pay to get on the DoubleDash list. I dunno.

7

Thank you. That does seem to be a really weird kind of promo.

8

I have no insider info, but I do use Doordash and Double Dash with some frequency. Usually, but not always, it goes to the same dasher.

The thing about Doordash is that it’s heavily algorithmic, and they probably calculate (my guess) a bunch of variables when determining which dasher to assign to a specific order, DoubleDashed or otherwise.

For example, maybe your McDonald’s dasher was already there, and was going to deliver another order to another customer near you anyway, so throwing in a coffee doesn’t add much time. Or maybe they’d been waiting for an order for a long time and the system gave it to them just to keep them happy. Doordash has to constantly juggle a four-way relationship between the restaurant, the dasher(s), the customer, and their profits. It’s not a simple one to one relationship.

If you carefully watch the order status on an order, it’ll often show you something like that, like “Your Dasher is completing a nearby order and will head to you soon.” You can also pay an upcharge to get priority exclusive deliveries. But otherwise, there are usually multiple dashers fulfilling multiple orders along nearby routes at any given time.

Doordash was also sued a few years ago for stealing Dasher tips. I don’t know the outcome of those suits. They also raise the prices of restaurant menus as a way to hide their fees. They are not a particularly ethical company… none of these gig economy companies are. They prey on restaurants, delivery drivers, and customers alike. But we enjoy the convenience, so we just go along with it all :man_shrugging:

9

I hadn’t considered my own location.

I agree the doordash Algorithm may have connected me and my 2nd dasher because she was near by.

10

I use Doordash because a friend bought me a year-long membership after I had a medical thing and was needing to have stuff delivered for a while. Apparently they were having some “treat a friend” special, where the year-long membership, which is already a lot cheaper than month-to-month, was even further discounted if you bought one for someone else, and you got a little money off yours the next time you renewed as well, and you also get a premium streaming channel with a year.

So yeah, I use the heck out of it.

When I double-dash, which is always planned, not an impulse, I’ve noticed the same guy usually does it if the two places are close, but not if they are more than a couple of miles apart; however, when it is likely a very busy time for one of them (9am on a federal holiday at Panera), I get different dashers even if the second place is in the same parking lot. So, I think these guys typically pick up multiple orders in one stop where it is the case that there are multiple orders.

When I am not asking for anything unusual, and the weather is good, I go with the middle of the three tips that Doordash recommends. When is is cold, raining, visibility is poor, or my order is big, or heavy, or awkward, I tip more. Sometimes a lot more.

I’m not sure if the recommended tip is based on more than the amount of the order of not, but adding something based on the difficulty seems like a good idea.

I’m pretty sure that drivers don’t drive all around for the double dash, and that a computer calculates what to assign to whom to make the trips efficient. I get my stuff awfully quick, even with a double dash.

The business model probably works on packing as much stuff into a trip as possible by getting more orders in the same short stretch of time. Three people ordering from three places in a 15 minute period is not as good as six places in the same time.

11

So here’s some interesting perspectives from the Dasher (delivery driver) side of things:

My takeaways from all of this:

  • Drivers are constantly bombarded by different delivery offers that they can accept or reject
  • Some offers are for food deliveries, some are for shopping (at grocery stores, convenience stores, pharmacies, liquor stores, etc.)
  • Rejected orders lower the Dasher’s acceptance rate
  • Higher acceptance rates are a primary criterion in a Dasher’s “tier”, and higher tiers give them preference in seeing new orders, i.e., the more orders you accept, the more “first dibs” on other orders you get
  • DoubleDashed orders are presented as another order, sometimes but not always to the original Dasher
  • The original Dasher can choose to reject the additional add-on order for any reason (low tips, they’re busy, they want to go home, they don’t want to wait in line, whatever). Or they may initially accept it, change their minds, and then drop it for another Dasher to pick up
  • The system is continually optimizing all of this, combined with routing/navigation and submarket business, so that Dashers are constantly basically bidding against each other
  • Sometimes when you DoubleDash and it gets assigned to two drivers, only the first driver gets your tips and the second gets none at all — the system apparently doesn’t make it clear to them (probably on purpose), screwing one of them over. Or the first driver could’ve chosen to unassign the second part of the order, but still keep the entirety of the tip without the extra work, leaving someone else to pick up the slack. (It’s unclear whether this can also happen if you explicitly add a separate tip for the second part of the order)

But basically, Doordash normally pits drivers against each other in more or less a bidding war, but with preference to loyal Dashers who accept at least 75% of their offers. Some people presumably eventually take even the shit offers just to keep up their acceptance rate.

12

It’s to pressure us into making a quick decision. You can double dash within the next ten minutes.

It’s like the old tv commercials.
This POS, cheap-made item is normally $99.99

But, if you call within the next hour!
Its $59.99

@Reply wow, you found some interesting cites about door dash.

Tipping is a sore point with me.

I wish that I could afford to Tip $20 everytime. But, I just don’t have those financial resources.

$6 to 7 is my standard Tip. A Whopper meal deal is over $13. My tip is already almost 50%

Shopping for me requires a bigger Tip
That’s why I didn’t only order Clear Eyes drops.

I have to make that $8 to 10 shopping Tip worthwhile.

Buy several things from Walgreens.
.

13

What happens if you’re out to dinner with the family and the bill comes to, say, a hundred dollars? You’re still only going to tip six or seven bucks?

14

Well, no. 25% to 30% tip for a restaurant meal over $40.

That doesn’t work with a $14 burger meal-deal.
25% of $14 is $3.50

I would never do that to a delivery driver.

$7 or $8 tip. More in bad weather.

I wish that I was Bill Gates’ bastard, love-child.

I’d carry a thick wad of hundred dollar bills for tips. :smiley:

Bill Gates has screwed a lot of people.

My mom wasn’t one of them.