In-N-Out sues DoorDash, claiming damages to brand
California-based In-N-Out Burger is suing online delivery company DoorDash, claiming In-N-Out's brand can be hurt by DoorDash's delivery methods, reports CBS News correspondent Mireya Villarreal.
With just a few clicks on the DoorDash app, you can have a West Coast burger favorite delivered to your home.
"If you think about it, 85 percent of restaurants in this country don't deliver, and so for almost all of these merchants, it really brings something new to them," said DoorDash CEO and founder Tony Xu.
But In-N-Out isn't biting. It filed a lawsuit against Xu's company, demanding it stop delivering their food, citing concerns about temperature and food-handling practices. It is also alleging "copyright infringement" because DoorDash uses the In-N-Out logo on its website and app.
"A brand is everything to these restaurants. They're putting so much time and money into it," said restaurant industry attorney Amy Adolph. "That's what sets these different restaurants apart."
But another burger seller welcomes the service. Meghan Dwyer, a marketing executive with upscale eatery Umami Burger, says DoorDash has helped open the door to new business.
"We found that, rather than saying no to incremental sales volume and potentially introducing a whole new set of people to Umami burger into our brand, that we would rather work closely with these third party delivery companies to ensure that people are getting the best product possible," Dwyer said.
Umami spent over six months building partnerships with DoorDash and other online delivery companies, including Amazon Prime and Caviar. But Umami also want quality control. "We want to make sure that the hot bags that they're using are up to the spec so that our burgers get delivered to our guests hot," Dwyer said.
But unlike restaurants that follow strict food handling guidelines, these new tech-driven delivery services - like DoorDash - are largely unregulated. That could change. "We're seeing this more and more with these on demand apps and on-demand services -- that cities are beginning to regulate them," Adolph said.
So whether restaurants like it or not, apps like DoorDash could be a taste of things to come.