Chefs+Tech: The Tricky Business of Comparing Delivery Apps

Comparing Apples to Oranges, or: UberEats to Everyone else A slightly misleading headline from Eater recently extolled UberEats, comparing the service with other top mobile-order delivery companies GrubHub, Caviar, and DoorDash. Instead of comparing the number of orders delivered (or total dollar amount spent, or any other metric touting actual orders), the comparison of monthly active users (MAUs) refers to unique people who opened the mobile app any time during one month. This is standard practice in the tech world, and a good way to measure engagement with a content app like Twitter, or a product like Evernote. This is less accurate, though, when determining the popularity of a delivery service. While the article itself notes the metrics by which they compare, this comparison is not the best way to determine who rules the market. Uber is a privately-held company and can keep its metrics close. Grubhub, as a publicly traded company, offers more insight into its business. Spec