Paywalled version
Reddit forums are awash with people seeking help for their self-prescribed online food delivery addictions.
“It’s getting exhausting having to fight my mind every day to not buy something to eat. It feels like an intrusive thought – boom, I can’t stop thinking about ordering food for the rest of the day. Even if I eat something at home,” says one user.
“It’s been to the point where I would order two to three times a day,” another user wrote. “$50 orders each, for weeks on end.”
is this a wide spread thing ? or a beat up ?
is it this, or house prices causing cost of living concerns ? (sarcasm)
Declaring where I am at , I have never ordered online here in Australia. Way to lazy and they seem expensive. I have occasionally when OS.
I used to order somewhat frequently when I first moved to the city on a weekend before the pandemic and the prices became cooked. Going from a small city of 3 Chinese restaurants and one sushi place to an entire city you can order from was awesome and novel.
Gradually every other order just started getting messed up. I was home pissed one night and decided to order some food while gaming with some mates. It came hours late and Uber offered me like five bucks off my next order and that’s after bitching about it. That’s was pretty much the end for me. The food can arrive whenever, in whatever state and so long as it arrives, fuck you eat your hour cold slop. I can buy and/or make better junk food myself for far cheaper in most case. With one of their main competitors folding I doubt it’s gotten better.
It also felt like some of the stores didn’t want to do Uber. That management saw the dollar signs but then wouldn’t put more staff on Fri/Sat when the stores would get swamped with orders from boozers.
In terms of Uber Eats specifically, another rising problem is the lack of competition. Menulog is dead and there are concerns about DoorDash’s future too. Of course, the obvious answer is to not rely on these services at all but we all know many people will not do that. We are going to end up with another monopoly in the food delivery space and this will become an even bigger problem.