I would argue it doesn't really work at any scale outside of extremely dense areas. where I live, there used to be good take-out joints and mediocre delivery jo

I would argue it doesn't really work at any scale outside of extremely dense areas. where I live, there used to be good take-out joints and mediocre delivery joints. none of the good places offered delivery, but the price for a meal was pretty similar. with grubhub and friends, a lot of the better places do offer delivery now, but it ends up being a bit more expensive. I'm pretty sure the places that do their own delivery have to cut corners on ingredients to be able to do it while matching the prices of their take-out only peers. that is, the delivery fee they add to the order doesn't actually cover the cost of delivery, so they make it up by cutting costs elsewhere. when the cost of delivery is transparent, most people just aren't willing to pay what it takes to employ even the most downtrodden citizens of a developed country to drive around delivering food.