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Comment by mhink | Hacker News Reader

Note: the Verge article links to this blog post, describing the situation in more detail: https://www.readmargins.com/p/doordash-and-pizza-arbitrage

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Thank you, this was a fun rabbit hole to dive down. That blog also has a well-argued article about Zero Interest Rate Policy which relates to the doordash story: https://www.readmargins.com/p/zirp-explains-the-world

They could have made another $5 per 10 pizzas after order #1 by just delivering the pizza to themselves and sending the same boxes back out in the next delivery, and so on.

An actual DoorDash driver had to do the delivery though. So you risk being reported and also, if they take awhile, pizza gets cold.

But they also could have just raised prices on everything but the cheap one DoorDash was using for pricing.

Risk being reported? To the company that you don't want interacting with you anyhow?

No, he means recycling the boxes not the pizza inside the box.

The pizza itself can be literally given away (although if not on the premises, then presumably a box would be required.)

I mean you can just have a silicone mold in there, no actual pizza required.

Junkfoodconomists term this "the velocity of pizza".

Maybe that's my EU mindset, but I'm baffled how it's even legal to add a company to your public listing - complete with fake phone number - and just declare they're taking deliveries, all against the explicit wishes of the company.

(Complete with "chill bro, I was just <s>joking</s>demand testing you" at the end)

The blogger calls this being "tricked" to sign up for DoorDash. Seems to me, this is the same way a burglar "tricks" you into giving them your valuables.

I can baffle you even more: if you register your company in Delaware, you don't even need to specify who owns the company.

You only need to specify the name and address of the registered agent, which is sort of a "contact person", not somebody who works for the company.

https://www.delawarebusinessincorporators.com/blogs/news/can... and https://velawood.com/anonymity-in-delaware/

Lots of states do this. It's not just some Delaware thing. If you're doing "solidly interstate" business there's other reasons to file in Delaware.

Other states are worse or better these days.

The US is

It could be a trademark violation, even in the US, under the argument that DoorDash was “passing itself off” as the infringed-upon company. However, DoorDash would then argue that it was being honest – it was genuinely delivering authentic goods. It could violate trademark no more than a convenience store violates a trademark by correctly claiming it sells Coca-Cola.

Well, you can probably add some fine print somewhere that listings are just for educational purposes or something and may not represent the actual company.

The pizza owner from that article is my wife’s cousin!

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