At least in my city, the taxi service had an "app" which theoretically allowed you to book a cab, but in reality, it was a crapshoot whether they would show up. It just put in a request to the dispatch but if nobody ever came to pick me up, calling the number just got me the same unhelpful dispatch.

This doesn't even get into the constant scams I would run across. Usually it was just drivers not running a meter and then charging some ridiculous price at the end of the ride. I don't care if you want the fare "off the book" so you can pocket the whole thing. Hustle your employer all you want, but don't hustle me.

I got into the habit of asking them to run the meter every time they started to drive off without starting it. If they still insisted that it was broken, I'd ask how much they wanted to charge me. If it was reasonable, I would accept. If it was stupid, I'd get out.

For all the complaints about Uber/Lyft, as a passenger, they are much more reliable and I know roughly what to expect every time.

So... are you trying to claim that Uber isn't a crapshoot whether the driver will actually show up?

I mean, many small towns have local food joints, but people driving by the highway will still stop at the McDonalds. I think Uber is kinda the McDonalds of transportation; travelers pretty much never want to bother finding out what the local taxi company is called nor they want to take risks with possibly unreliable/sketchy service.

I think Uber Eats' marketing of "we're not the jealous type" kinda expresses it well: there are use cases where Uber is undoubtedly superior (convenient ride summoning), and for other cases where cabs fit the use case, it's often a low-stakes choice, such that things like branding and reputation might trump other qualitative metrics such as price.

And for what it's worth, in many markets, Uber offers a bunch of price-oriented services that taxis simply aren't able to: the pool service was the most well known offering in the US, but in Brazil for example, it also serves "I need a ride NOW, and willing to pay premium, take my money" (the Prioridade service) and "I'm very price sensitive and willing to ride a motorcycle to save a few bucks" (the Moto service).

> Food delivery is very low margin and companies have realised there is pretty much no money to be made here as an expensive middle man

Somebody should probably tell that to the millions of public market investors who have bought into these public companies worth tens of billions of dollars.

https://www.google.com/search?q=doordash+stock&oq=doordash+s...

https://www.google.com/search?q=uber+stock

https://www.google.com/search?q=grub+stock&oq=grub+stock

In fact if you're sure there's no money to be made, you could short them all and make a killing. Have you done that?

That's a whole other discussion. Having a good stock price does not equate to profitability. Vast amounts of money are pumped into loss making companies in the hope of future returns, either when other people pump money in to raise the price, or a profit is eventually returned. Uber has yet to post a profitable quarter, let alone year. Doordash has had one quarter in the black. This is during a pandemic, when use of these services has skyrocketed.

By some analysis, food delivery companies have a potential margin of about 2% from delivery alone. Which is why these companies are trying to find other ways to take in more per order and hopefully one day make a profit.