DoorDash Blog

Here at DoorDash, we’re on a mission to put entire cities within thumb’s reach, which makes our next announcement all the more exciting. Today we are officially launching in Miami, Florida – putting us in more than 30 major metropolitan areas to date.

Dash all day, eat all night -- we’re offering quick and reliable delivery from hundreds of Miami restaurants, including national favorites like P.F. Chang’s, The Cheesecake Factory, and Taco Bell. You can also indulge in local hot spots, like Meat Market and Harry’s Pizzeria, without even leaving the comfort of your home or office. Place an order through our DoorDash app and watch it magically appear at your address within minutes.

Starting today, DoorDash is available for delivery in South Beach, South Miami, Miracle Mile, Coral Gables, Kendall, Kendall Lakes, Doral, Midtown, Wynwood, Brickell, Buena Vista, Coconut Grove, Design District,  Little Havana, Pinecrest, Cutler Bay and Palmetto Bay, with more neighborhoods to be added later this year.

To celebrate our arrival in Miami, we’re offering $0.99 delivery from over 100 partner restaurants from launch until May - three months to find your new favorite restaurant. Even better, for a limited time enjoy FREE delivery from The Cheesecake Factory and Meat Market.

To add to the celebration, we’ll also be offering alcohol delivery for the very first time on the east coast. In partnership with Liquor Mart, have your favorite spirits delivered in time for a late-night beach party or weekend brunch.

The perks don’t stop there either, keep an eye out for our special Friday giveaways. From now through March, enjoy some of your Miami favorites for free, while supplies last:

2/10 - Sushi burritos from Burrito San  (11am - 12:30pm)

2/17 - Acai bowls from Pura Vida  (2pm - 4pm)

2/24 - Half Pints of Ice Cream from Azucar

3/3 - Poke bowls from Japanito  

3/10 - Boba from Lan Pan Asian Cafe

By Anna Katherine Barnett-Hart, Colorado General Manager

A little over one year ago, DoorDash launched delightful delivery in Denver, bringing folks in the Mile High City delicious restaurant dishes straight to their doorstep. Since then, DoorDash has rapidly grown into one of the largest on-demand services in the greater Denver area, working with top Denver eateries like Sushi Sasa, Lohi Steakbar and Steuben’s.

Over the past year we’ve heard loud and clear from our Denver area customers that they want delivery in more locations across the front range.

So today, we’re excited to expand our Colorado footprint into Boulder and the surrounding towns. Delivery will now be available from hundreds of restaurants in Boulder, Lafayette, Louisville, Superior, and Broomfield from 11am to 10pm, with later hours on the weekends. For the first month, delivery is just $1-$2, where you can order from local hot spots and national favorites such as:

Modern Market

Five on Black

Beau Jo's

Pizzeria Locale

The Cheesecake Factory

Red Robin Gourmet Burgers and Brews

Taco Bell

As a Boulder native, I’m excited that we’ll be taking part in Boulder's culinary revolution and that we’re helping make it easy and convenient for everyone to sample all that the Boulder area has to offer.

The Boulder area has been rapidly evolving into a true dining destination. I’ve personally witnessed an incredible transformation in the Boulder food scene over the past ten years with an explosion of cuisine types, fine dining, and a real local culinary personality. From the farm-to-table fast casual fare at Modern Market to Brazilian bowls at Five on Black, the Boulder area has something for everyone. And there are still plenty of long-standing local delights, like the Avocado BLTs at Foolish Craig's and the Mountain Pies from Beau Jo's.

By Stanley Tang, Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer

All types of Dashers use DoorDash on a daily basis to complete deliveries. Some people drive cars, while others use bikes, motorcycles, scooters, or even walk. Each form of transportation has its own unique set of skills. Scooters can go through traffic easier, but are limited in the size of food they can carry. Bikers don’t have to worry about parking, but hills can be tough. Cars can pick up big catering orders but sometimes have to circle the block looking for a parking spot. Knowing that each type of Dasher has its own tradeoffs, today we’re adding another Dashing method into the mix, with it’s own unique set of skills and abilities: robots.

Today, we’re announcing a pilot partnership with Starship Technologies to test integrating their delivery robots into DoorDash’s operations. The partnership will begin by trialing robot deliveries in Redwood City, CA, in the heart of one of our most popular markets. As part of the test, we’ll look to see if robots can provide the speed and service customers come to expect from DoorDash, while also exploring how customers interact with the robots and learning how the robot works with the restaurant’s operations. People can expect to see Starship robots carrying a DoorDash order in Redwood City in the coming weeks.

We see robot deliveries as a unique complement to the existing Dasher community. Since, Starship’s robots have a smaller carrying capacity and drive on sidewalks, they are better suited for carrying a small meal down the street, rather than a few pizzas. We expect to use robots to deliver these smaller, short-distance orders that Dashers often avoid, thereby freeing up Dashers to fulfill the bigger and more complex deliveries that often result in more money for them. We also plan to explore using robots to bring food from a restaurant to a local hub: with this approach, Dashers would no longer need to park outside a restaurant or wait for the food, but could simply meet a robot at a parking lot to pick up the food and take it directly to the customer. Ultimately, we think we can use robots to improve the Dasher experience and make the deliveries they do even easier and more efficient.  

DoorDash and Starship share a vision of transforming last-mile delivery. While some companies have pursued autonomous technologies by flouting local laws, Starship has already received approval to test their robots in Redwood City. And while other companies are exploring robotic vehicles that lack the infrastructure for delivery, we’re excited to be using our existing logistics network, meaning you’ll see robots fulfilling deliveries in weeks not years.

What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas -- and now that includes delivery from DoorDash!

Starting today, DoorDash is launching in the greater Las Vegas area to bring the best food the city has to offer right to your doorstep. Enjoy fast and fresh delivery in just minutes from some of your Vegas favorites -- we’d bet good money that you’ll end up satisfied.

We’re now Dashing in Westside, Chinatown, Southwest, Spring Valley, Summerlin, South Summerlin, Southeast, The Lakes, Green Valley, Seven Hills and Anthem, with more neighborhoods to be added later this year. With hundreds of local restaurants to choose from, indulging in your favorite Sin City eats is easier than ever.

Order in from your favorite go-to or take a gamble and try something new. We’ve got all the options, from national favorites to local staples, including:

Viva Mercado's

 Dom DeMarco's Pizzeria and Bar

Ted's Sushi Burrito

Lazy Dog Restaurant and Bar

Public School 702

The Cheesecake Factory

P.F. Chang’s

Grimaldi's Pizzeria

DoorDash is excited to launch in our very first market of 2017 and our 29th major market to date. To celebrate, we’re giving you 99-cent delivery from local hot spots like Blue Ribbon Fried Chicken, Those Guys Pies, Off the Hook, and CREAM.

"For years, we've been committed to giving our customers the best restaurant experience," said Albert Scalleat, owner of Dom DeMarco's Pizzeria & Bar. "Partnering with DoorDash and utilizing their top-notch delivery and logistics platform will help us continue to expand and give that same, delightful experience to more customers around the Las Vegas area."

By Paul Zabelin, Software Engineer

At DoorDash our engineering teams are constantly building out new code to improve our user interface (UI) on iOS. Recently, we developed our own unique testing system that combines a framework called Keep it Functional with Quick, a behavior-driven development framework. We have seen that our KIF-Quick system provides the very best testing results and are proud to announce that that it’s an open source project, so we encourage others to take a look and give it a try.

To dive deeper, we chose to use Keep it Functional, or KIF for testing for many reasons, but one stands apart -- reliability. We need to be able to trust that a test is 100% accurate, the test either passes or fails, everytime. KIF also tests quickly and with ease, which was a major draw to the framework. It’s key that a test does not take up too much time to run, while still providing reliable results.

At the same time, we also develop and write our unit tests in Swift and use the Quick and Nimble frameworks to help. For more context, Quick is a behavior-driven development (BDD) framework for Swift inspired by RSpec. We chose to use Quick because it is easier to read due to its organization, which helps making testing code a lot easier.

Using Quick for our iOS UI testing gives engineers more readable specifications with nested contexts. Plus, our UI tests benefit even more from BDD style when unit tests in our domain specific language are shared beyond the development. Which is why at DoorDash we have chosen to use the two in conjunction. KIF-Quick gives us hands down the best experience and results for UI testing because of its ease and reliable outcomes -- because after all, they say “your code is only as good as your test”

Examples

Compare two examples of tests for app login below. The first example is using KIF-Quick and the other shows a regular XCTest.

KIF Spec using Quick BDD syntax in Swift

KIF Test in Objective-C

As you can see from above two examples, the first (using KIF-Quick) offers more readable syntax, which is especially useful in organizing multiple contexts.

By Mitchell Koch, Software Engineer

At DoorDash, we want to make it as easy as possible for people to discover and order from great restaurants in their neighborhoods. As part of that goal, one fascinating problem we’re tackling is how to create a personalized experience for each user on the DoorDash platform by surfacing recommendations for restaurants and other merchants based on his or her order history. We’ve been experimenting with a variety of techniques for personalizing the DoorDash experience, and though we’ve just scratched the surface, we’re always looking for ways to improve our models.

For a recent hackathon project we wanted to model the similarities between cuisines on DoorDash, both to better understand the problem, as well as to use this data to improve our recommendations. Here, the question is, if we know you like certain cuisines, what other cuisines can we recommend?

To do this, we used Bayesian network structure learning over order data. A Bayesian network is a probabilistic graphical model that represents the relationships between variables and their dependencies in a graph structure. In our case, we have variables for cuisines such as “Spanish” and “Tapas,” and we want to represent the probability distribution between those, capturing that if you like Spanish food, you’re very likely to like Tapas as well. A Bayesian network structure learning algorithm finds a compact representation of the joint probability distribution between all of the variables in the data. Put simply, it allows us to find the probability of ordering one type of cuisine given that you’ve already ordered from a different cuisine. While using interventional data would allow us to get true causality, in this case we can see the relationships between cuisines but we can’t be confident in the causality of the arrows. To learn the network structure, we used a hill climbing approach, which resulted in the graph below. You can try this technique on your own data using the bnlearn R package. (While Bayes nets can represent inverse relationships, we only showed positive relationships in the graph below.)

From a quick look at the results, the graph shows some interesting relationships. As expected, if you like Italian, you’re likely to enjoy Pizza or Pasta. But there are some surprising results here as well: for example, if you like Fast Food, in turns out you’re likely to enjoy Chinese food too.

By Sylvia Burwell, HHS Secretary and Christopher Payne, DoorDash Chief Operating Officer

Workers across America know that our economy is changing. Not long ago, the easiest way to get affordable, quality health coverage was to find a job with a large employer. If you were self-employed, working part-time, freelancing, or looking for flexible work that was based on your schedule, it could be tough to find a health plan that worked for you. If you were shopping on the individual market and had a pre-existing condition, it could be impossible. Today, the Affordable Care Act and the Health Insurance Marketplace are building a health care system that works for everyone – no matter where people get their insurance.   

Thanks to the Marketplace, Americans have more options for coverage. Entrepreneurs can now chase their ideas and innovations without being locked into a job just to keep health insurance. Artists and musicians can pursue their passions while freelancing in their free time and still find affordable health insurance on the Marketplace. People working flexible hours or taking some time to transition between jobs can still find the peace of mind and security that comes with affordable, quality health coverage.

HHS is working to get these Americans the information they need to understand their coverage options during this Open Enrollment, which runs until January 31. We’re meeting them where they are – no matter where they work.

Meanwhile, companies like DoorDash are providing flexible jobs to people around the country. People who sign up to be a Dasher on DoorDash complete deliveries from restaurants and other local merchants and deliver items to their neighbors around town. And the people who choose flexible work opportunities like DoorDash are supported in part by flexible benefits like those enabled by the Affordable Care Act.

Together, HHS and DoorDash are getting the word out that the Marketplace is open for business. We’re letting people know that until January 31, Americans in every state can visit HealthCare.gov to shop for affordable, quality health coverage.   

Here are a few other important things we want everyone to know about Open Enrollment:

Coverage on the Marketplace is affordable. Most Americans shopping on HealthCare.gov will be able to find a plan between $50 and $100 per month, thanks to financial assistance. Once you submit an application on HealthCare.gov, you’ll immediately see the type of coverage you qualify for and how much financial help you can get.

Shopping and picking a plan is easier than ever before. HealthCare.gov has tools to help shoppers easily compare plans based on their doctor, their medications, and their personal health care needs. We’ve phased in changes to make it smoother and more intuitive to shop on a phone or tablet. And the average shopper will be able to choose from 30 different plans.

Free help is available. If you have questions, you can call the Marketplace Call Center (1-800-318-2596), which is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. You can also visit LocalHelp.HealthCare.gov to find in-person assistance in your community.

By Ben Dearborn, Business Operations Associate

Here at DoorDash our data team ensures we count everything: the number of orders coming in per day, the amount of time it takes for a restaurant to prepare a salad, the percent of people who order in chalupas from Taco Bell, and much, much more. With another new year upon us, once again we are digging deep into our data stacks to look back at the past 12 months and figure out what people ate in 2016.

The most popular

During a wild year with many changes, the most popular restaurants stayed remarkably constant. The most orders this year came from sandwich restaurants (like Ike’s Sandwiches), followed by burger restaurants (like Red Robin) and salad restaurants (like Sweetgreen). Pizza and Fast Food restaurants rounded out the top five.

While Pizza and Chinese foods are normally synonymous with delivery, we saw an incredible diversity in orders this year, particularly in terms of international cuisines. Mexican food was the most popular global cuisine on DoorDash in 2016, followed by Italian, Chinese, Japanese, and Thai.

Meanwhile, when it comes to specific items, french fries were once again the most popular item ordered through DoorDash. Sodas and soft drinks came in second, followed by pad thai, cheeseburgers, and the super burrito.

Fastest growing

While the most popular items and cuisines give a glimpse into day-to-day eatings habits in 2016, it’s also fun to see what types of orders spiked throughout the year. This year we saw people testing out new diets and eating healthier, with orders from organic restaurants gaining the biggest increase over 2015, followed by orders for paleo food and smoothies. Soul food came in fourth and pho came in fifth in terms of the biggest increase in orders from the previous year.

In terms of fastest growing specific items in 2016, DIY was clearly a fad. The “create your own burger” came in number one and the “build your own salad” was number 5, as people clearly crave customizability along with their convenience. Other items in the top 5 fastest growing items include taco al pastor, avocado toast, and the California club.

Going local

With fries being the most popular item two years in a row, we wanted to see who was ordering all those potatoes. It turns out that the Northeast sure loves their fries, with New York seeing the greatest percentage of orders including fries, followed by Boston, Chicago, Toronto, and Columbus.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the country we saw a new trend in poke deliveries, with the most orders for poke coming from California. Orange County was the number one market for poke orders, followed by Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, and Austin.

Item by item

With Mexican food as the most popular international cuisine and super burritos as the number five most popular item, we wanted to dig deeper and see what other types of burritos people order. After super burritos, the most popular order was the regular burrito, followed by the breakfast burrito, the bean and cheese burrito, and the California burrito.

We also saw some fun data around salad orders. The Caesar salad and Greek salad were number one and two, with the Chinese chicken salad sneaking into the top 3, followed by the cobb salad and the taco salad.

This year we launched a partnership with Whole Foods Market in select markets, and saw some unique data from their deliveries. One of the great features of Whole Foods Market is their wide selection of fresh items available for delivery, so you can order sandwiches, salads, sushi and more all in the same order. With everyone’s intense love of cheese, it’s no surprise that the most popular item from Whole Foods Market this year was the macaroni and cheese, followed by the half classic roasted chicken. After that came the turkey avocado bacon club, the salmon avocado sushi roll and the sautéed spinach and garlic.

This year we also introduced alcohol delivery on DoorDash, and from beer to wine to liquor all types of alcoholic beverages were available for delivery through the platform. This year the Apothic Red Blend wine was the most popular alcoholic item on DoorDash, followed by three beers -- Coors Light, Stella Artois, and Lagunitas IPA --- and Skyy Vodka coming in fifth.

Key moments of 2016

2016 also had some truly memorable nights, which resulted in some notable deliveries.

For example, this summer, the world tuned in to Rio De Janeiro to watch countries across the globe compete in the Olympic games. The night of the Olympic Opening Ceremonies we saw people getting into the local spirit with their food choices, as Brazilian food delivery increased by a whopping 54%. Similarly, orders for Latin American food increased by 32% and orders for Portuguese food (the official language in Brazil) increased by more than 25% that night.

In another major sports event this year, the Chicago Cubs broke their 100+ year curse to win the World Series in epic fashion. On the night of Game 7, Chicagoans supported their team by ordering in a hometown favorite: hot dog orders in Chicago increased by 107% over a typical night. Nationally, orders from pubs, wine bars, and falafel all spiked as people ordered in to watch history unfold.

Of course, no discussion of 2016 would be complete without mentioning the presidential election. On Election Night, we saw people getting into the party spirit with a 90% increase in orders from liquor stores, 79% increase in cupcake orders, 50% increase in orders from wine bars, and 46% increase in pizza orders. Funny enough the day after Election Day we saw a 59% increase in Canadian cuisine orders, perhaps a reflection of people who were considering a move north after seeing the election results.

DoorDash and beyond

Beyond the data, 2016 was a huge year for DoorDash as well. We expanded our coverage area to 28 major metropolitan markets across more than 250 cities. We introduced alcohol delivery and opened up our platform to fulfill deliveries that originated outside our marketplace. We welcomed numerous new partners including Red Robin, Whole Foods Market, Carl’s Jr,  Baskin-Robbins, and Jack in the Box. And all the while, we continued to iterate on our core product by making delivery faster, simpler, and more delightful.

Thank you for being a part of DoorDash as we continue on this epic journey. You can see the full data sets for 2016 below and from all of us at DoorDash, we’d like to wish you a very happy holidays, a great new year, and a delightful 2017.

The full lists:

Most popular cuisines

Sandwiches

Burgers

Salad

Pizza

Fast food

Mexican

Italian

Breakfast/ Brunch

Chinese

Japanese

Most popular international cuisines

Mexican

Italian

Chinese

Japanese

Thai

Most popular items

French Fries

Soft Drink / soda

Pad Thai

Cheeseburger

Super Burrito

Bacon Cheeseburger

Chicken Tikka Masala

Fried Rice

Garlic Naan

Miso Soup

Fastest Growing Cuisines in 2016

Organic

Paleo

Smoothies

Soul Food

Pho

Fastest Growing Items in 2016

Create your own Burger

Taco al Pastor

Avocado Toast

California Club

Build Your Own Salad

Top Fries ordering Markets

New York

Boston

Chicago

Toronto

Columbus

Top Poke ordering Markets

Orange County

Los Angeles

San Francisco

San Diego

Austin

Top Kale ordering markets

Los Angeles

Manhattan

Vancouver

Phoenix

Brooklyn

Top Pumpkin Spice ordering markets

San Diego

Bay Area

Nashville

LA Valley

Minneapolis

Top Wings ordering Markets

Columbus

Indianapolis

Charlotte

Bay Area

Atlanta

Most popular items ordered from Whole Foods Market

Macaroni and Cheese

Half Classic Roasted Chicken

Turkey Avocado Bacon Club

Salmon Avocado Roll

Sautéed Spinach and Garlic

Most popular alcoholic beverage

Apothic Red Blend

Coors Light

Stella Artois  

Lagunitas IPA  

Skyy Vodka

Most popular Burritos

Super Burrito

Regular Burrito

Breakfast Burrito

Bean & Cheese Burrito

California Burrito

Most popular salad

Caesar Salad

Greek Salad

Chinese Chicken Salad

Cobb Salad

By Kristin Wright, Dallas Associate General Manager

Tis’ the season to be jolly and joyous, and starting today, Texans can order through DoorDash and help support those in need this holiday season. DoorDash is proud to announce our 12 Days of Delight campaign, where now through Christmas Day we’ll donate $6 from each qualifying order to our local food banks, up to $15,000.

All you have to do is simply order from any of the participating Texas restaurants and we’ll donate $6, which buys up to 18 meals! The donations will be split evenly among three food banks across Texas, including the Central Texas Food Bank, North Texas Food Bank, and Houston Food Bank

Participating restaurants, who are also contributing to the donations are Landry's Seafood, Saltgrass Steak House, Grotto, McCormick & Schmick's, Babin's Seafood House, Becks Prime, Cristina's Fine Mexican Restaurant, McAlister's Deli, and Lupe Tortilla. So whether you want a juicy steak cooked medium rare or carnitas tacos with savory tomatillo sauce, you can order in and know that by doing so, you’re helping support a person in need during this special time of year.

By Brian Sommers, Mid-Market Executive

While the days are getting shorter, your list of delivery options just got even longer. Today, we are excited to announce a partnership delivering from Red Robin Gourmet Burgers and Brews, our largest ever partnership with a national casual dining burger chain.

Delivery is available from more than 70 Red Robin restaurants throughout Phoenix, Seattle, Los Angeles, Indianapolis, San Francisco, Chicago, Dallas, Houston, Charlotte, N.C., Washington D.C., Columbus, Ohio and Minneapolis, with hopes of expanding to additional markets early next year.

Nationwide, burgers and fries are the most popular food items ordered through DoorDash, making Red Robin the perfect addition to DoorDash’s growing list of partner restaurants. Last year cheeseburgers were the most ordered burger type (41.5%), followed by bacon cheeseburgers (33.1%), hamburgers, double patty burgers and turkey burgers. And Red Robin has nearly every burger you could imagine to satisfy those cravings.

For example, you can have the delicious Chili Chili™ Cheeseburger delivered, along with the mouthwatering Whiskey River® BBQ burger. Or try sinking your teeth into The Wedgie™ Burger, stacked with bacon, guac, tomato and red onion inside of a lettuce bun. With so many options on the menu, you can guarantee everyone will be happy to receive this delivery.

By Abhay Sukumaran, Product Manager

From the very start, DoorDash was founded with the goal of being the local logistics layer for every city. To get there, we began by building a consumer-facing marketplace focused on possibly the most complicated item to deliver correctly: food. Over the past three years we’ve been learning from millions of deliveries, training our data models, and building the technology to get food delivery right. While we continue to double down on restaurant delivery by signing new partners and expanding to new markets, we’ve also been building the tools necessary to support additional types of deliveries through DoorDash and to bring us one step closer toward our ultimate goal of delivering anything from anywhere.

Today, we are launching DoorDash Drive, our fulfillment product that allows businesses to deliver orders that originated outside the DoorDash marketplace. DoorDash Drive is the first step to opening up the DoorDash platform to everyone, so if you’re a merchant and want to make day-to-day delivery operations easier than ever, check out Drive at doordash.com/drive/discover or learn more in our "Getting Started" blog post.

The Technology

The challenge of offering any business a Dasher on-demand is huge and incredibly complex. Traditional delivery and logistics companies have it comparatively easy with a finite number of vehicles, a specific number of warehouses, and a known quantity of deliveries on any day. In contrast, deliveries through DoorDash are dynamic, with a constantly fluctuating number of Dashers, customers, orders, pickup locations, and delivery destinations. Our challenge was to take this intricate, ever-changing system and put it into order.

To do so, we reworked our technology so that DoorDash Drive would offer the best possible experience for customers, merchants and Dashers. We built different types of predictors to account for the greater difficulty of Drive orders; we built technology to identify Dashers that are equipped to handle larger orders; we introduced more intelligent routing; we added real-time monitoring for merchants; and we used our machine learning to improve the entire network after every delivery.

We’ve been testing Drive for the past few months, and the response from restaurant partners so far has been incredible. While restaurants like Buca di Beppo and Lemonade are using DoorDash Drive for catering, other businesses have begun using it for more complicated deliveries. For example, Coolhaus uses Drive to restock their ice cream in retail locations, and Greenleaf Chopshop uses Drive to deliver their salads and smoothies to Equinox gyms across LA. We've even seen interest in using Drive to deliver things beyond food including mattresses, Christmas trees, and much, much more.

The Future

As we look to the future, we know that Drive is just the first step in our mission to allow any local merchant to offer delivery. After testing the service in a few markets this Fall, DoorDash Drive is now available across our more than 250 cities, and in the coming months we’ll be integrating Drive into our merchant apps as well as building out an API for anyone who wants to access an on-demand delivery network and integrate it into their customer ordering, supply chain management, or other in-house systems.

While building the local logistics layer for cities has always been our goal, that plan has also been based on a deeper mission: to help local merchants grow their businesses. Now, you don’t need dozens of trucks driving around the state to stock retailers nor do you need a storefront on every corner to reach customers. Instead, we can simply provide you a Dasher when and where you need one. And by giving the power of an entire delivery fleet to small businesses for the first time, we are empowering every store and restaurant to take advantage of their entire city and connect with more customers through delivery. Check out doordash.com/drive/discover to learn more and look out for additional Drive updates, apps, and APIs in the coming months.

By Fuad Hannon, Product Operations Manager

Today we are launching DoorDash Drive, our first step in launching a DoorDash platform that allows merchants to deliver meals or other items that are ordered outside the DoorDash marketplace. DoorDash Drive builds on our years of work creating technology for restaurants and our deep experience in the delivery space to give every business their own on-demand delivery fleet. As a restaurant owner, that means you can refocus your staff on building a great in-house experience rather than dispatch them to deliveries, save money by utilizing our world-class technology, and grow your business by taking on more orders without worrying about having enough drivers to fulfill them.

How it works

Using DoorDash Drive is simple and quick. Once signed up, you are able to place orders up to two weeks in advance or up to an hour ahead of time, giving you the flexibility to use DoorDash Drive in the way that best serves your business. Whether you plan to schedule a week’s worth of deliveries in advance, or simply use DoorDash Drive to handle last minute deliveries you normally would have rejected, all we need is a few pieces of information to get started.

First, simply enter an order with the delivery location, delivery time, and size of the order. Once you submit the details our logistics technology kicks into high gear. Our algorithm offers these orders to Dashers who are equipped to handle larger orders, while our support software monitors the order through every step - from a Dasher accepting the order all the way through to delivery - to ensure a consistently excellent customer experience.

Other product features built into DoorDash Drive include:

An Active Orders page that acts as your “mission control” center to see the status of every delivery, which Dasher has accepted each delivery, and the exact locations of the Dasher.

An Order History page where you can see all prior deliveries by day or by store (for a business with multiple locations) to easily reconcile your accounting and better understand customer behavior.

A dedicated support team for DoorDash Drive that will be on the phone with you in no time to handle any questions or thoughts you may have.

DoorDash Drive applications

We know all business don’t face the same challenges, so we’ve built DoorDash Drive to be as flexible as possible. From national chains with hundreds of locations and a centralized process, to single-location family-owned restaurants, businesses around the country have found that DoorDash Drive is customizable to their needs. For example, while Buca di Beppo has been using DoorDash Drive for delivery orders processed by a national team, Coolhaus has been using Drive to restock their ice cream in retail locations, and Greenleaf Chopshop uses Drive to deliver their salads and smoothies to Equinox gyms across LA.

How to get started

Simply go to doordash.com/drive/discover and provide us a little bit of information on your business, what challenges you face, and how you would like to use DoorDash Drive. From there, a member of our Operations team will be in touch to help get you started on the platform. Within 24 hours you’ll be up and running, allowing your restaurant to go from never offering delivery to having a fleet of thousands of Dashers at the touch of a button within a day.

Tens of thousands of Dashers across the US use the DoorDash platform to keep a flexible schedule, make extra cash, and fund their personal goals. And we work hard to make sure Dashers have the resources they need to thrive on DoorDash every single day. While Dashers love the flexibility of these types of platforms, one reason many people choose to stick with a full time job is because of the health insurance offered by their companies. Historically, health insurance has been tied to a job, meaning that people often ended up staying longer in roles where they were unhappy simply because they felt unable to leave. However, the Affordable Care Act and similar programs are now making it easier than ever for people to start their own businesses, pursue their passions, or work part time, by offering health insurance that is independent of people's day to day jobs.

Today, we’re collaborating with Stride Health to make it easier than ever for Dashers to take advantage of the Affordable Care Act and get access to affordable health insurance. Stride will not only help Dashers access government exchange plans, but they will also provide additional helpful features like year-round support from their health advisors and exclusive pharmacy deals. In addition, Stride guides Dashers through every step of the health insurance process, from applying for subsidies to waiting on the phone with the insurance company.

Stride is particularly great for finding discounts and other monthly subsidies that most people might miss, often making health insurance less expensive than a phone bill. They are also quick to help you find the right plan with a doctor you know and trust, often in just 10 minutes. Finally, by providing different ways to model your health expenses and any possible emergency scenarios that may come up, they can help save you even more money.

Collaborating with Stride Health is just one of the many efforts we have in the works over the next year to help Dashers get the most out of their experience on DoorDash. To get started today,  check out the personalized DoorDash + Stride Health page at doordash.stridehealth.com.

By Kristen Webster, Senior Communications Associate

It’s that time of year again: the leaves are changing colors, there’s a chill in the air, football on the TV and turkey in the oven. But in addition to that festive Thanksgiving dinner, another new tradition is becoming more popular than ever: Friendsgiving.

This year, we’ve seen more and more people celebrating Friendsgiving with the help of DoorDash. And with so much to do between shopping for presents, cooking for families, and of course attending all those holiday parties, we know that DoorDash can make life just a bit simpler. So, to simplify your life, here are five tips to help you navigate Friendsgiving 2016.

1. Make Items ahead of time

Not all items on the Friendsgiving table need to be made day-of. Items like pies, casseroles and relish plates can all be prepared ahead of time. So, figure out what on the menu can be made early and space out the cooking.

2. Push dinner go-time back a bit

Many people invite guests over early to snack on appetizers, enjoy a football game, and just hang out before dinner. This trick is simple: give yourself a cushion. Take whatever time you anticipate your meal being ready and push it back by an hour. There’s no harm in telling guests to come over at 4pm instead of 3pm. Plus, that way people aren't getting antsy waiting around and you give yourself a little more time to prepare. It’s a win-win!

3. Buy some, make some

Sometimes the best dishes are the ones you didn't cook, and there’s no shame in that! Are you a master at potatoes? Get to mashing and order in the dishes you just can’t bring yourself to make. DoorDash has you covered with a wide selection of delicious items, delivered to your doorstep in minutes. Focus on what you enjoy, and leave the rest to the professionals.

4.  Savor the little things

Remember the reason your friends and family have all come together under one roof: to be together. Sit back, relax, and savor the little things. Spend less time stressing, and more time chatting, playing games, and laughing.

5. Rest up the night before

By Danielle Penny, Software Engineer Intern

This summer I was ecstatic to work as a software engineer intern at DoorDash. It was an incredible, intense summer - I learned a remarkable amount about software engineering that no textbook could have taught me. I also discovered the work culture that I work best in, what makes technology startups like DoorDash thrive, and what it's like to work in the Silicon Valley hustle and bustle. 

Some background: I'm a senior at MIT majoring in computer science. I found DoorDash through a career fair, and was intrigued by its take on using technology to empower restaurants, particularly small businesses. Once I discovered DoorDash I fell hard and quickly - I knew my summer was destined to be spent in San Francisco.

My first interview was with my ‘would be’ manager, and I loved hearing how excited she was about the engineering projects she spearheads and the ownership she feels at DoorDash. Throughout the interview process I remember thinking:

These people are all so smart

They really are passionate and love DoorDash

They were genuinely curious about my interests 

I was thrilled to receive an offer and happily accepted. After mentioning that I was interested in working on the merchant-facing side of DoorDash during my interviews, I was placed on the Merchant Team.

My love for the internship had two main parts: the team and the work.

The team: Respect each other, learn from each other, and get to know each other.

DoorDash really sees itself as a family and I was fortunate to have felt a part of many teams (or families) this summer - the merchant team, the interns, engineering, and DoorDash as a whole.

During my summer with DoorDash, we went on a team retreat to Lake Tahoe. This was a great chance to dive into a product and get to know my team members outside of the office. The goal was to launch a big project by the end of the week, so there were some late nights spent strategizing, complimented by many fun festivities, including hiking, card games, and delicious dinners.

Throughout my internship I was impressed with the respect shown at DoorDash. On each project I worked on, I noticed that everyone's voices, including mine, were heard and valued. With the foundation of respect and appreciation for your team members set, it becomes much easier to work well together to create great products. Shoutout to my amazing managers, who were always there to help me learn, answer questions about life and DoorDash, and gave me meaningful work.

There are many facets to the company - the three sides of the product (consumer, Dasher, and merchant), engineering, sales, bizops, and more. For DoorDash to succeed there needs to be dedicated teamwork across all channels, and DoorDash consistently showed that. People never hesitate to admit when mistakes were made, and teams are constantly collaborating and providing support. After engineering outages, teams send out a post-mortem to describe what caused the issue and what they’re doing to fix it (in the short and long term). No task was ever too big or too small, and people are always in it together. There isn’t a sense of hierarchy in the company and everyone seems highly accessible. During the interns’ first few weeks our CEO Tony, and several other executives reached out to us to have lunch. Later on when I wanted to collect more wisdom, I just slacked them again and they happily made time for me to chat!

The work: 'Hacker mentality with a focus on quality. Move fast, with grace.’

Every day our team was ‘executing’ (our PM’s favorite word). The team moves fast, and people are constantly releasing products and features! DoorDash is built off of the desire to always be bettering the product, pushing yourself to create something great, and settling for no less. Because DoorDash is a relatively new company and because we move so quickly, we’re constantly learning. We’re always connecting with our customers, Dashers, and merchants to see how we can better fit their needs. I really came to respect how much the user experience is put first.

While working on these projects, I was proud of my work and felt complete ownership on several projects that I worked on independently. Though, I always had the help and support of my manager and team when I had questions. For example, I created the homepage for our merchants, implemented a new type of promo code that used a percent off feature, and created the deals page for the website. It’s really exciting that these projects I worked on are now being used by people every day and that I was able to work on more than just a button or an optimization.

Because of DoorDash’s philosophy to empower engineers to drive the company’s vision, we all get to take ownership of projects. And because people are so smart, it’s amazing to see what things people are able to create! It was sometimes intimidating being surrounded by people with more knowledge and experience than me, while being given a lot of responsibility -- but that allowed me to grow so much more than if I was just left to the side and given an easy trivial ‘intern-type’ task.

My summer at DoorDash was one that I’ll never forget, and I’m so lucky to have been part of such an amazing team and company. I learned that loving what you do, loving the product, and loving your team are key to a happy, successful career. To anyone considering applying for an internship (or full time) at DoorDash, I say DO IT. You’ll be challenged, you’ll learn SO much, you’ll be a part of a fun, close knit, crazy-smart group of people, and you’ll gain an experience you couldn’t find anywhere else.

By Ryan Alt, USMC, Associate General Manager San Diego and Austin King, US Army, Operations Associate New York

Sally Park is one of Charlotte’s all-star Dashers. She works with DoorDash delivering pizzas, burritos, and more to people across the Queen’s City to bring in some extra money for her family, to meet new people, and because of the gig’s flexibility. She is also a US Veteran.

Sally enlisted in the North Carolina Army National Guard in the summer of 2007 after spending three years in her high school's JROTC program. The daugher of a retired Marine, she was raised around Veterans and knew from an early age that she wanted to continue in the family’s tradition of military service. After attending basic training, Sally served as an Army Intelligence Analyst. And after returning home to Charlotte, she started working with DoorDash on the side.

Today, on Veterans Day, we honor those in the Dasher community who have spent time serving their country in the military. As Veterans ourselves, we’re proud to work for a company that is both welcoming to those that have served, but also that provides such incredible opportunities for those transitioning back to civilian life.

For example, Sabrina O’Connell is a Dasher in Phoenix, and was one of the first people to sign up for work on DoorDash when we launched in Arizona last summer.  She joined the Army in 1988 after graduating high school, and is a Desert Storm Vet, having served as a supply clerk in both active duty and the Arizona national guard. Sabrina loves working on DoorDash because of the flexibility and freedom to work any time she wants and for as long or as short as she wants. But Sabrina is also one of the many Veterans who deals with PTSD. As she told us, “Everyday is a different day for me dealing with PTSD but [DoorDash’s Phoenix team members] have been understanding and patient with me. I couldn't work for a company with strict hours and attendance policies. That's why I'm still contracting with DoorDash and I love being a Dasher!”

For those looking for flexible, part-time work as they transition from active duty service, DoorDash has become a natural fit. Not only does it provide the freedom many people need to make their own schedules, but for those of us who have served in the military, the skills needed to be a top Dasher come naturally. In the military, you are trained to accomplish a mission both by using a set of known information in front of you but also by reacting to unknown or unexpected situations that may come up along the way. At DoorDash, that’s what Dashers have to do everyday.

Sally and Sabrina are just two of the hundreds of Veterans among the Dasher ranks. But there are many more. Dave Erickson, who dashes in San Diego and started serving in the army in 1991 said, “Working for DoorDash helps me feel as though I am still serving my neighbors, my fellow citizens.” Nondas Sable-Williams, an Army Reservist who has worked as a Combat Medic, Petroleum Specialist and Human Resources Specialist, said, “The most important skill that I learned from serving in the military is to have integrity even when no one is looking.” The list of Dasher Veterans goes on and on.

As soldiers, sailors, aviators, and marines, we learn integrity, determination, teamwork, and the importance of serving our fellow citizens. These are not just military skills -- these are skills that serve us everyday at DoorDash, whether it be as a Dasher, or as a General Manager of an entire market.

By Andy Mai, Software Engineer

Earlier this year, at Apple’s Worldwide Developer’s Conference, we demoed a way for DoorDash customers to place group orders directly from the new iMessage app.

After polishing up the feature for the past few months and seeing the successful roll out of the new iMessage for iOS10, we’re excited that DoorDash for iMessage is now available with the new DoorDash iOS app. Now you can order in lunch with coworkers, plan a pre-football tailgate, or order dinner for the whole family, all from an existing iMessage group chat.

So how does it work?

To start, make sure you have the DoorDash app enabled for iMessage. To do so, click on the app store icon within iMessage, then select add a store, under the ‘manage’ tab and slide the DoorDash app to ‘on’.

Once the app had been installed into iMessage, create a group message, click on the app store icon and select DoorDash to see a list of your favorite restaurants, just as you would in the DoorDash app.

From there, it’s as simple as sending a text message. Once you pick a restaurant from DoorDash’s awesome selection, a new chat message will appear in your conversation with the group order ready to go. Just send the message to the other participants in the iMessage group chat and they are ready to go.

By tapping on the chat bubble, people who already have the DoorDash app will be taken to the store’s menu page, where they can add items to the group order. They can then send updates (i.e., Jeff added 3 items), to other participants by updating the chat bubble. A participant who does not have the DoorDash app will be prompted to download it directly in iMessage and then can proceed to add his or her selected items to the group order. Once everyone has chosen their food and added it the cart, the creator of the group order can submit the order whenever ready. And voila, food for the team lunch has been ordered!

At DoorDash we’re always looking for ways to make delivery easier than ever, and we’re excited that this integration makes DoorDash work so seamlessly with an app most people use every day.