8 DoorDash Alternatives for Every Restaurant Goal

DoorDash and other third-party services provide a plug-and-play option to offer online orders and delivery. They definitely make it easy for customers to find you, but the 15%-30% commissions are crushing your margins. 

Luckily, you have options: 

• Continue to partner with third-party apps, but explore DoorDash alternatives with added features and lower fees.
• Earn direct orders from your site using modern tools that make setup easy and help customers find you online.

In my experience, you’ll find the best value with a mix of third-party apps and a direct online ordering service. But there are still several alternatives to choose from, so I’ll help you settle on the perfect partner for you. 

Direct Order Competitors

• Owner.com to grow direct order sales
• Sauce for fixed fees and customer service
• Menufy for restaurants new to delivery
• Popmenu for dine-in concepts

Third-party Competitors

• Uber Eats to start ASAP
• Grubhub for major metro areas
• Instacart if you have a retail side
• ChowNow to cut commissions

Well-rounded direct order alternatives for growth

Direct ordering brings your digital customer service to the next level. Customers can place orders directly on your site, which gives you more control over customer experience, data and promotions.

With the right tools, it’s not much more difficult than working with the third-party guys. And you don’t owe anyone else a commission rate. You pay a flat monthly fee based on features and services instead. 

Direct ordering is ideal for growth, but it’s quite an investment if your restaurant is still establishing itself or you’re brand new to online ordering. That said, you still have some low-risk options.

Below, I share my favorite direct ordering platforms for various restaurant goals. 

Owner.com: Drive direct order volume

I want to kick this off with my product, Owner.com. I’ve worked with thousands of restaurants who use Owner’s online ordering and marketing tools to grow their direct sales. So I’m confident that Owner.com is a top DoorDash alternative because the data doesn’t lie:

• Websites that use Owner.com convert 2-4 times better than the average restaurant website. 
• Restaurants that use our branded mobile apps earn 85% more return customers. 
• Brand’s like Talkin’ Tacos have earned over $2 million in direct online sales with Owner.com.

Owner.com is the only DoorDash alternative designed to increase your total orders by getting you more traffic from Google, converting that traffic into customers, then turning those customers into regulars.

That’s because we prioritize SEO for restaurants, so your website turns up when someone searches for your cuisine in your area. When 62% of diners search for restaurants online, it’s essential that your website stays at the top of Google results.

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We also optimize Owner.com restaurant websites to get people to order. Compared to a normal restaurant website, people are three to five times more likely to become a customer of an Owner.com restaurant.

Just ask Rahul, owner of Saffron Indian Kitchen. After they switched to Owner.com, they started getting over 750+ new customers every month from Google. 

The platform also offers a loyalty program, just like Starbucks. This helps customers collect points and better rewards the more they order. Additionally, the Owner.com branded app makes it easier for customers to order and get repeat orders.

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That said, we aren’t the best fit for every restaurant. Owner.com is a premium product targeted toward established, brick-and-mortar restaurants that want to grow online orders rather than build a customer base from scratch. 

Restaurants serving food that travels well like pizza, burgers, and Mexican food will thrive with our direct ordering platform. 

Smaller restaurants and franchises aren’t a great fit. We’re not the best choice for bakeries, food trucks, and fine dining when takeout isn’t a major sales strategy, or it’s less than ideal for your product quality.

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‍Sauce: Simple, fixed-fee delivery

Sauce is another commission-free solution for restaurant takeout and delivery. They partner with several driver networks and charge a set delivery fee with the claim that they can cut your delivery costs by 50%. 

Delivery support is its key feature. They handle customer disputes on your behalf, including issues with payment, delivery, billing and more. 

Like the other direct ordering services, Sauce partners receive website ordering as search and social platforms like Google Business and Instagram. You’ll also receive simple loyalty programs to help drive engagement. 

However, the customer engagement resources aren’t as robust as platforms like Owner.com. You don’t get automated marketing and search optimization isn’t as high a priority. 

Menufy: New to direct delivery

Menufy offers free setup so it's a good option for new restaurants that want to test online orders. But you won’t save on commission like you can with other direct ordering platforms. 

If you want to use their delivery network, Menufy charges a 12.5% commission.

The company doesn’t charge a monthly fee, either. Instead, Menufy charges a flat order fee that the customer can pay. Your restaurant still has to cover a 2.75% + $0.30 fee per order for online payments.

Feature-wise, this low-cost service is pretty limited. You’ll get an online ordering portal for your website, as well as placement on Menufy’s marketplace. 

But you don’t get SEO support, a mobile app, loyalty rewards or automated marketing to keep customers engaged. 

Popmenu: Direct ordering for dine-ins

Popmenu is great for dine-in restaurants and provides a custom website for online orders. But it lacks a mobile app or loyalty program, essential for a complete restaurant management system.  

That said, restaurants do benefit from unique social media and front-of-house features that make it great for dine-in concepts. The system includes a social media calendar and AI writing tools. Plus, it plays well with more POS and back-office integrations than some other services.

Despite its beautifully designed websites and menus, they’re not well optimized. The customer experience is often clunky with too many clicks and load times, so conversions aren’t stellar, either.

Still, it’s a solid solution if you want to setup online ordering for your loyal customers but still prioritize your dine-in services. 

Third-party DoorDash competitors

DoorDash is one of many third-party services that aim to make online orders and delivery accessible to all restaurants. 

They’re great for increasing your sales volume and attracting new customers. However, you pay the literal price with expensive fees and limited control. The larger the platform and number of users, the more it costs. 

In my experience, these services are all pretty similar, but there are a few key feature and pricing differences. 

Uber Eats: Quick start success

Uber is a standout name in the gig economy, with several services beyond their food ordering and delivery service — Uber Eats. This recognition means two things:

• Your customers already know who they are and likely have the app downloaded. 
• They have great resources for new partners to get started. 

As far as services and pricing, Uber Eats is extremely similar to DoorDash. They both have solid customer support, commission fees between 15%-30% and direct web services. 

Uber Eats stands out for us with its onboarding resources. In addition to written guides and 24/7 customer support lines, Uber Eats has several online video tutorials. 

Their YouTube channel is full of playlists for owners to see and navigate the merchant portal. Videos are also pretty accessible with different languages and additional resources linked in the descriptions. 

‍Grubhub: Delivery in major metro areas

Grubhub is another of the big three third-party apps. While it’s a much lower share of the total market value at 8% (vs. DoorDash’s 66%), it’s booming in major metropolitans. 

You might not have a lot of luck in cities like Lexington, KY, but Grubhub is a hit in NYC. 

Grubhub also rebelled a bit with their pricing structure. Instead of commission rates, the service charges a 5%-15% marketing fee. Technically it’s a much lower rate, but that’s a bit deceiving. 

The 5% fee applies to the lowest-tier plan with fewer big-ticket features compared to the other apps. You also owe a 10% delivery fee for Grubhub drivers. So you’ll have to run the numbers for yourself, but Grubhub pricing evens out on par with other third-party services.

Instacart: Retail and restaurant hybrids

Instacart delivery goes beyond restaurant takeout. They partner with retail, warehouses and restaurants to deliver everything from groceries to party decor. 

If your restaurant features a retail space with local vendors, specialty groceries or other general goods, Instacart can help you market all of your products. 

But Uber Eats is a better choice if you’re just a restaurant. In fact, Instacart recently partnered with Uber Eats to allow their customers to tap into the Uber Eats restaurant platform using the Instacart app.

Instacart still has its own app with a list of partner vendors to browse. The app includes select marketing features to boost sales and order sizes and backend data for owners to evaluate their online performance. 

ChowNow: Cut commission costs

ChowNow exists somewhere between third-party and direct orders, but we’ve ultimately grouped them with Uber Eats, DoorDash and Grubhub. 

This company provides online orders and sets your menu up on sites like Google Business and Yelp to attract new customers. It also charges a monthly fee rather than a commission, so it stands out from the other big three apps. 

Unlike other direct ordering systems, they route customers to their own app rather than an ordering platform on your unique site. 

So ChowNow can help you cut back on commissions, but they’re not that effective at growing your direct orders. If earning more direct online orders is a top priority for you, I’d recommend exploring modern alternatives to ChowNow better suited to that goal.

Go direct and earn more from every order

Online ordering is the wave of the future, and third-party services like DoorDash aren’t going anywhere any time soon. These marketplaces are a great way to get in front of customers, but solely relying on third-party apps isn’t sustainable with your restaurant growth. 

You don’t have to limit yourself to plug-and-play third-party guys when there are so many DoorDash alternatives available. In fact, using third-parties to attract new customers while converting users to a separate direct ordering platform is a great restaurant marketing idea. 

We’ve seen restaurants on Owner.com earn millions in revenue once they increase focus on direct online sales. Not only can you reduce fees to boost your average profits, but direct ordering platforms make it easier to convert guests to regulars.

Ready to try it for yourself? Enjoy a free demo of Owner.com and see how much you can save without commission costs.  

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