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Five companies now control over 90% of the restaurant food delivery market

marketsaintefficient.substack.com

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Re: Five companies now control over 90% of the restaurant food delivery market

#271

Post by mindwok »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #11

This is essentially the story of tech companies across nearly every industry where they have come to dominate. This is one reason that I see most tech companies as essentially a net negative for society at large, as the goal is nearly always to control a large monopoly (and this is fully admitted by many tech leaders, e.g. Thiel) which the Internet makes possible. Pre-Internet you would see the same dynamics, but usu…

Weird timing to see this, as I have come to the same conclusion and was writing a blog post on it. I think we need to start figuring out how to modify our economic system to prevent this, because as you pointed out the tech world is much more “winner takes all” than the physical world, and watching industries consolidate globally under a handful of players is extremely concerning.

Re: Five companies now control over 90% of the restaurant food delivery market

#272

Post by mindwok »

fasterik wrote: post #101
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #11

This is essentially the story of tech companies across nearly every industry where they have come to dominate. This is one reason that I see most tech companies as essentially a net negative for society at large, as the goal is nearly always to control a large monopoly (and this is fully admitted by many tech leaders, e.g. Thiel) which the Internet makes possible. Pre-Internet you would see the same dynamics, but usu…

There's a George Carlin bit about politicians. The punchline is "the problem isn't the politicians, it's the people." His point is that nothing emerges from a vaccuum. Politicians are people just like everyone else, they're just responding to incentives created by a majority vote. Tech companies are just like any other company, except a lot more people are willing to pay for their goods and services. If Carlin were a…

Both things can be true. Amazon is great for consumers, Google is great for consumers, no doubt. But consolidation of economic power under tech juggernauts I would argue is a net negative for society over the long run. The tech giants are not at fault, neither are the consumers, the fault lies with the system in which they operate that allows one outcome while ignoring another (potentially bad) one. What we need to do is change the rules.

Re: Five companies now control over 90% of the restaurant food delivery market

#273

Post by Spooky23 »

lynx97 wrote: post #201
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There's an air of let's go back to the good old days when we were hunter gatherers to the whole thing. I strongly disagree. On the contrary, I see the arch of many technological advancements in that, in the beginning, they solve a crucial need, but then once they solve that problem they attempt to hijack the positive feedback systems of humans (e.g. addiction systems) to stay in power. Consider the food industry. M…

Just because Americans have an obesity problem doesn't make every food vendor a drug dealer. Come on, get real. Basically everything that is being sold can be abused by the user. Does that mean every vendor of anything is potentially a bad actor? I believe you are exaggregating. BTW, I virtually never thought about Thiel when I ordered a Pizza. Is there a reason why you drag the owners into this? It basically sounds…

When no ceiling is imposed, the natural state of business is to consume all oxygen.

It doesn’t matter that you don’t know who Peter Theil is when you buy a pizza. It matters that he somehow makes money from that pizza and if he can, he will extract more value than the pizza guy.

Re: Five companies now control over 90% of the restaurant food delivery market

#274

Post by tminima »

esco27 wrote: post #28

The food industry is due for a good old opensource disruption, where each restaurant can setup their private menu hub (like you would an instagram account), add their payment processing details, and start delivering their own orders. It's a win-win for the restaurant and their recurring customers.

Some locations in India are experimenting with https://ondc.org/ which is similar to this kind of model.

Re: Five companies now control over 90% of the restaurant food delivery market

#275

Post by AbstractH24 »

These delivery companies have become a far bigger "Evil" than Amazon or any other megatech company people often like to criticize. Because they provide nearly no benefit to anyone on any side of the marketplace and increasingly offer horrible customer service.

But as I write this on the deck of a lake cabin I rented in New Hampshire, I'm reminded how different the world is outside of big cities like my home in NYC. There is one place on Doordash up here.

Re: Five companies now control over 90% of the restaurant food delivery market

#276

Post by AbstractH24 »

ks2048 wrote: post #15
ro_bit wrote: post #3

The title scared me a bit before I opened the article and realized it was talking about restaurant->consumer food delivery services. While that isn't great, I was initially thinking was that the companies that facilitate the food delivery supply chains around the world were massively consolidated (I sure hope they aren't)

I'm pretty sure the food supply sources are massively consolidated. I don't know about the delivery part or why that would matter more than the actual food production. A quick search will lead to quotes like "Four companies now control more than half of the market in chicken processing (Tyson, JBS, Perdue, and Sanderson), close to 70 percent in pork (Smithfield, JBS, Tyson, and Hormel), and nearly three quarters in b…

Then there is the whole industry of facilities management and food service at places like stadiums and airports. Also run by a few big players.

Re: Five companies now control over 90% of the restaurant food delivery market

#277

Post by delichon »

AbstractH24 wrote: post #275

These delivery companies have become a far bigger "Evil" than Amazon or any other megatech company people often like to criticize. Because they provide nearly no benefit to anyone on any side of the marketplace and increasingly offer horrible customer service. But as I write this on the deck of a lake cabin I rented in New Hampshire, I'm reminded how different the world is outside of big cities like my home in NYC. T…

Please explain why people are collectively spending billions of dollars on these services if they provide nearly no benefit to anyone.

Re: Five companies now control over 90% of the restaurant food delivery market

#278

Post by AbstractH24 »

esco27 wrote: post #28

The food industry is due for a good old opensource disruption, where each restaurant can setup their private menu hub (like you would an instagram account), add their payment processing details, and start delivering their own orders. It's a win-win for the restaurant and their recurring customers.

It's crazy to think, but I think we're quickly reaching an inflection point where the generation of on demand multi-sided marketplaces that gained steam in the 2010s is ready to be disrupted itself.

Re: Five companies now control over 90% of the restaurant food delivery market

#279

Post by AbstractH24 »

delichon wrote: post #277
AbstractH24 wrote: post #275

These delivery companies have become a far bigger "Evil" than Amazon or any other megatech company people often like to criticize. Because they provide nearly no benefit to anyone on any side of the marketplace and increasingly offer horrible customer service. But as I write this on the deck of a lake cabin I rented in New Hampshire, I'm reminded how different the world is outside of big cities like my home in NYC. T…

Please explain why people are collectively spending billions of dollars on these services if they provide nearly no benefit to anyone.

I said "nearly," not no benefit whatsoever.

Personally speaking, I use it because it allows me to be lazy. Every time I do I say next time I wont.

Re: Five companies now control over 90% of the restaurant food delivery market

#280

Post by danaris »

robertlagrant wrote: post #267
kazinator wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tech companies are not like other companies because they can trivially create vendor lock-in without any geographic constraints on where the customers are. In fact, it's harder to avoid vendor-lock in in tech; it takes extra work to open things up, possibly a lot of extra work. Even a well-intentioned open-source program can garner a user base which can't easily migrate off it.

The customer is responsible for avoiding vendor lock-in, not the vendor.

Then let's use regulation to flip that around, and put the onus on the party that

a) is making money off it

b) has a vested interest in increasing lock-in

c) is a singular entity, not a dispersed set of individuals

d) is doing this as part of something specific and organized, rather than just trying to go about their daily lives, buying an orange here and a smartphone there

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