--- title: "Grubhub's co-founder is back, charging $1 where DoorDash takes up to 30%" description: "Matt Maloney went public with Bites on October 7; Olo's no-commission app went live October 20. DoorDash's Q3 report lands November 4 with its take rate under attack from both." publisher: "The Inference" section: "Applications" published: 2026-10-22T15:14:48.180Z modified: 2026-10-22T15:14:48.180Z canonical: https://theinference.org/article/grubhub-s-co-founder-is-back-charging-1-where-doordash-takes-up-to-30 language: en keywords: "Food Delivery, DoorDash, Startups, Restaurants" --- # Grubhub's co-founder is back, charging $1 where DoorDash takes up to 30% > Matt Maloney went public with Bites on October 7; Olo's no-commission app went live October 20. DoorDash's Q3 report lands November 4 with its take rate under attack from both. ## The founder of Grubhub now sells ordering without the commission Matt Maloney co-founded Grubhub in 2004 and left in 2021 after its sale [1][2]. This year he quietly helped start Bites, a pre-seed startup with about 300 restaurants signed up in the San Francisco Bay Area, and his role went public on October 7 [1]. His case: the industry's billions in infrastructure spending are finished, "and yet the pricing has stayed the same" [1]. Bites charges restaurants a flat $1 per order and diners a fixed $6.99 delivery fee [2], sends orders straight into point-of-sale systems through partners such as [Toast](https://theinference.org/markets/companies/toast) and Square, and accepts orders placed inside ChatGPT [1]. What the $1 attacks is the take. [DoorDash](https://theinference.org/markets/companies/doordash) publishes [merchant plans charging 15%, 25% or 30% of each delivery order](https://www.thestreet.com/restaurants/olo-food-delivery-app-doordash-uber-eats-rival-lower-prices) [3], the cut behind [$4.45 billion of second-quarter revenue on 970 million orders](https://www.sec.gov/cgi-bin/browse-edgar?action=getcompany&CIK=0001792789) and an $83.1 billion market value on October 20 [4]. ## The numbers show no bend yet, and owners are already moving The reported numbers show no compression yet. Revenue divided by orders works out to about $4.59 an order in the second quarter, against roughly $4.30 a year earlier on the same arithmetic [4][5]. GAAP net income ran $200 million, down 30% on the year, on record revenue [4][5]. The shift is showing up owner by owner: Jay Jayaraman, who runs 13 restaurants listed on Bites, estimates his orders have flipped from 80% DoorDash to 65% Bites [1]. *Chart: **DoorDash revenue has doubled since 2023 while net income sits 30% below its Q2 2025 peak** Line chart: DoorDash quarterly revenue climbs from about $2.2 billion in Q3 2023 to $4.45 billion in Q2 2026, while GAAP net income peaks at $285 million in Q2 2025 and falls to $200 million a year later.* *Quarterly revenue and GAAP net income, billions of US dollars, from DoorDash's SEC filings, Q3 2023 through Q2 2026. [4][5]* DoorDash's published reply, [an August email to Bay Area restaurants](https://theinference.org/article/doordash-sent-warning-letters-as-a-chatgpt-ordering-rival-undercuts-it-by-13-56-a-pizza), warned they might be listed on Bites without consent and that, depending on the state, "such practices could be illegal" [1]. DoorDash spokesperson Lisa Singh said "some restaurant partners raised concerns," and that partners who had opted in needed to do nothing [1]. DoorDash answered a $1 fee with a form letter [1]. ## Olo opened a second front on October 20 Olo, whose software already carries 3.5 million orders a day for 800 brands at about 90,000 locations [3][6], [launched a consumer app on October 20](https://app.olo.com/) with more than 250 brands, no restaurant commissions and a flat 5% diner fee ([fee math charted here October 21](https://theinference.org/article/olo-takes-a-flat-5-on-delivery-where-doordash-and-uber-eats-charge-restaurants-up-to-30)) [3][7]. In a New Jersey price check on October 21, one Five Guys basket totaled $20.37 direct, $20.81 on Olo, $22.26 on DoorDash and $23.29 on [Uber](https://theinference.org/markets/companies/uber) Eats [3]. *Chart: **One Five Guys basket, four totals: Olo undercuts DoorDash, ordering direct undercuts both** Bar chart of final totals for one Five Guys basket: direct $20.37, Olo $20.81, DoorDash $22.26, Uber Eats $23.29.* *Final totals, US dollars, for one cheeseburger and small fries at a New Jersey Five Guys on October 21, 2026: menu subtotal plus fees and taxes, tip excluded; the Uber Eats total includes a $1.15 Uber One discount. [3]* ## Neither challenger owns the couriers it depends on Maloney claims a surge in downloads and thousands of restaurants asking to join since his role became public; no independent count exists [2]. Bites rides courier networks that already exist [2], and Olo compares third-party fleets, Grubhub included, rather than fielding its own [7]. DoorDash, for its part, said in September it is [building agentic ordering, AI agents placing orders on diners' behalf, into iMessage](https://www.theverge.com/ai-artificial-intelligence/1005726/doordash-ai-agentic-food-delivery-bites) [1]. Revenue per order is still rising. The question on November 4, when the third-quarter results land after the close [4], is whether it bends. ## Takeaway Two no-commission challengers, Matt Maloney's Bites and Olo's new consumer app, are attacking the 15% to 30% cut DoorDash takes on delivery orders, but DoorDash's revenue per order has bent not at all yet; its November 4 report is the first test. ## Sources 1. [The Verge, Mia Sato, "AI could upend food delivery", 7 October 2026](https://www.theverge.com/ai-artificial-intelligence/1005726/doordash-ai-agentic-food-delivery-bites) 2. [Inc., Victoria Salves, "Grubhub's Co-Founder Came Out of Retirement to Challenge DoorDash. His $1 Fee Isn't the Real Threat", 21 October 2026](https://www.inc.com/victoria-salves/grubhub-co-founder-came-out-retirement-challenge-doordash/91422763) 3. [TheStreet, Aparajita Chatterjee, "DoorDash, Uber Eats have a new rival, offering lower menu prices", 21 October 2026](https://www.thestreet.com/restaurants/olo-food-delivery-app-doordash-uber-eats-rival-lower-prices) 4. [ad-hoc-news.de, "DoorDash schedules November 4 results for DoorDash stock", 21 October 2026](https://www.ad-hoc-news.de/boerse/news/corporate-news/doordash-schedules-november-4-results-for-doordash-stock/70382521) 5. [DoorDash, quarterly revenue and GAAP net income from its SEC filings, retrieved 22 October 2026](https://www.sec.gov/cgi-bin/browse-edgar?action=getcompany&CIK=0001792789) 6. [Olo, "Olo App: Food Delivery + Pickup", accessed 22 October 2026](https://app.olo.com/) 7. [AndroidHeadlines, "Olo Takes On DoorDash and Uber Eats with No Menu Markups", 22 October 2026](https://www.androidheadlines.com/2026/10/olo-takes-on-doordash-uber-eats-no-menu-markups.html) --- Grubhub's co-founder is back, charging $1 where DoorDash takes up to 30% — The Inference. Canonical: https://theinference.org/article/grubhub-s-co-founder-is-back-charging-1-where-doordash-takes-up-to-30