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This last month, after a four-year respite, I once again became a vegetarian. But do not fear, dear readers, my reasons are my own and I am not here to preach—feel free to chow down on a chorizo and potato breakfast burrito as you read this because there is no judgement here. However, do spare a thought for my man, who was seduced by my posole and Sourdough Nick cheeseburgers, but now finds blocks of tofu where his tri-tip used to be.

The pandemic has undeniably been a boon for third-party food delivery companies. DoorDash, as we described late last year, posted profits for the first time in its history, owing largely to pandemic-fueled deliveries to the suburbs. Similarly, Uber told investors late last year that it too expects to finally hit profitability, likely by the end of 2021, owing largely to—you guessed it—UberEats.

For our last market research blog of 2020, we decided to review the year by looking through a guilty-pleasure lens, so to speak. This means looking at the year’s blogs that dealt with alcohol, junk food, and even CBD. It was a tough year, we all did what we had to do to get through it. See you in 2020. 

Well at least it’s almost over, amiright? 2020, what a mess. It  always had a new way to hurt us, only ever briefly pausing the pain to give us some good news (looking at you, MBJ), and felt gratuitously endless. You really do not need market research to tell you that 2020 was horrific, but through it all, we’ve been there with you, chronicling market research and the world that shapes it every week in this humble blog. 

DoorDash went public this week, smashing its expected market value on the heels of its first profitable quarter. The company currently owns nearly half of the US third-party delivery market, up from their one-third share only a year earlier. According to DoorDash, they claimed just 17% of US market share in 2018, but have steadily increased this to their current ~50%, which is twice that of its largest competitor, UberEats.