McDonald’s struck a major deal with Grubhub this week to expand the burger mega-chain’s McDelivery program in the NYC and Tri-State areas.
McDonald’s ended its exclusive delivery partnership with Uber Eats earlier this year. Then, in July, it added DoorDash to its roster to expand McDelivery further across the U.S. Among third-party delivery services, DoorDash currently holds the number one spot in terms of market share.
But Grubhub is still the top service in NYC and many other parts of the Northeastern U.S., including Boston and Philadelphia. Mired in controversy it maybe be, it’s still McDonald’s best bet when it comes to expanding delivery to as many locations as possible in that part of the country.
In the press release, McDonald’s said the Grubhub-Seamless partnership will expand delivery to 500 locations in the NYC and Tri-State areas, while overall delivery is expected to be a $4 billion business for the company in 2019. As is becoming the norm with major delivery partnerships, Grubhub will integrate its service directly into the McDonald’s POS system to streamline and speed up orders. McDonald’s did not say when exactly the new delivery program will become available.
The aggressive delivery expansion is part of McDonald’s push to transform all of its locations into “Experience of the Future” stores, which emphasize tech initiatives like self-order kiosks, mobile ordering and payments, and AI powering the drive-thru. And, of course, delivery.
Grubhub, meanwhile, has been building more of a presence in the rest of the country. In August, the service announced nationwide delivery with Shake Shack as well as a partnership with Dine Brands, who owns Applebee’s and IHOP restaurants.
Leave a Reply