Chipotle's New In-App Delivery Means Less Clicks to Get Your Fix

When it comes to delivery, Chipotle is positioning itself as ahead of the curve on adoption. The chain recently took its partnership with DoorDash a step further and rolled out the option for ordering delivery without leaving Chipotle's own app or website. The new integration launched last week, on July 11, in all 70 markets and over 1,700 Chipotle restaurants that DoorDash currently services.

"This is a test, and an opportunity for us to learn about customer demand for delivery," Nicole West, Chipotle's vice president of digital strategy and product management, told Skift Table in an email.

In its initial launch period, there's a $20 minimum on in-app orders, and the delivery fee is $5.99 in New York City. Diners can still order Chipotle through DoorDash's own app or website, where the delivery fee was $3.99 at time of publishing in the same location.

Chipotle CEO Brian Niccol hinted that this was in the pipeline at the company's special investor call at the end of June. "We're very excited about the idea of being able to, once you're in our app, stay in the app," Niccol said at the time. "I think people are going to be excited about the speed at which they can get Chipotle delivered to them."

Providing white label delivery service is part of DoorDash's strategic growth plan as well. When the delivery service announced a $500 million round of funding in March, CEO Tony Xu said that part of the cash would be directed towards building DoorDash's white label delivery operation. The company also announced today that Prabir Adark, Uber's former head of global finance, is coming on board as DoorDash's chief financial officer.

Like many restaurant chains, Chipotle sees delivery as a big growth opportunity. While digital orders currently only account for 8.8 percent of sales, digital orders have been up by 20 percent and mobile orders specifically have been up by 41 percent year-over-year, according to the company's most recent quarterly earnings report. Chipotle will be reporting second quarter earnings on July 26.