Saving Money on DoorDash
Welcome to Saving Money with Andrew!
The pandemic has affected our lives in many ways, including our eating habits. Pre-pandemic, we ate out occasionally and mostly cooked meals at home or picked up from a restaurant down the block. During the pandemic, ordering food became common to the point that DoorDash is now a major expense. And expensive it is—in addition to DoorDash’s delivery fee and service charges, they also charge restaurants steep fees, which often lead to higher menu prices on DoorDash than in the restaurant itself.
If you also find yourself using DoorDash frequently, here are a few tips for savings:
Buy Discounted Gift Cards
$50 and $100 DoorDash gift cards are often available at a significant (10-20%) discount on Best Buy and Amazon, usually with a purchase limit. To track these offers, I use SlickDeals’ Deal Alerts to receive email notifications for any DoorDash-related deals. Since we use DoorDash at least 1-2 times per week, it’s almost always worthwhile to pick these up when they’re available.
In addition, when there aren’t any deeply-discounted cards available, you can purchase discounted gift cards from a reputable online marketplace like Raise, which I discussed in depth in 2019. The savings on these gift cards is typically smaller (2-5%), but better than nothing.
World Elite MasterCard
Earlier this month, DoorDash announced a promotion with Mastercard in which all World and World Elite Mastercard holders can receive a free 3 month DashPass membership and (if they have a DashPass membership) receive $5 off their first two orders each month. Many Mastercards, including the Citi Double Cash Card (my favorite) are World Elite. The promotion is valid until September 2022.
DashPass
DashPass is DoorDash’s $9.99/month membership, offering $0 delivery fees and reduced service fees on orders above $12. DoorDash claims the average savings for DashPass members is ~$4-5, which is roughly accurate in our experience, so the breakeven point is about 2-3 orders per month. We order from DoorDash at least twice per week, so this is a no-brainer for us. But, as always, watch your recurring subscriptions carefully.
Order Directly
Finally, if you order from a restaurant often, consider ordering delivery or pickup directly from the restaurant. The restaurant will save on the DoorDash fee, and the menu prices may be meaningfully lower.
And now…Andrew’s pick of the week:
I really enjoyed this New Yorker article about the highest levels of competitive Tetris. If, like me, you spend way too many hours playing it on a GameBoy (or your console of choice), you’ll enjoy this story about how Gen Z Tetris players are revolutionizing the way people (still!) play Tetris.
I hope this has been helpful. If you liked it, please share it on social media! Also, please send me your feedback, requests, and success stories.