The Deceptive World of Ghost Kitchens

Personally the most horrifying part of this is paying 17$ for a burger.

Doordash now labels virtual kitchens after backlash from this video. Good on you for exposing!

$17 for a generic burger from a place that basically pays no bills, almost zero employees to pay for, zero everything. The amount of profit these generate is insane.

It's basically restaurant dropshipping.

I’m a DoorDash driver and I spent ten minutes looking for a Chinese food place to pick up my customer’s order only to find out their “authentic Chinese food” was inside a TGI Friday’s.

i remember when merch used to be a hoodie, or maybe a phone case if you were extra fancy. we're out here dropping burgers now 💀

this majorly sounds like a tax avoidance thing, i'm betting each 'business' counts 1/40th of the revenue but 100% of the costs

Starbucks signed a partnership with a ghost kitchen here in Austin. Now delivery lattes are made by folks stuck in a windowless factory environment.

Every time Eddy said “I lied” my eyebrows just kept getting higher and higher. Jaw on the floor. Absolutely flabbergasted.

Jacksfilms randomly running the focus group had me absolutely giggling, he is the unemployed friend

I know it's been a year, but "but we only serve people through delivery apps" it so fucking scummy. These are kids who haven't trained themselves to be skeptical yet.

I’ve watched this video 100 times trying to find out how to do my senior econometric thesis on ghost kitchens. I have degrees in political science, economics and logistics and my family owns a small restaurant and this is the biggest ethical conundrum i have ever encountered in every single facet. Ghost kitchens are economies of scale but violate the theory of the informative prerequisite of voluntary exchange. There is no way to effectively tax these businesses in places that have employee based rates. You can’t impose legislation on a place that doesn’t exist. My family’s deli relies on a difference in experience and hospitality to provide living wages for workers and find locally sourced meat and produce as possible but when that difference is removed from the equation, we’re fucked. I think about this every day.

Jacksfilms just appearing out of nowhere only to host a focus group is incredible

To be honest I think just the fact that they take up so many slots on delivery apps is the most sinister thing. Their restaurants are selling the same item with 9 different names; they don't need that many separate restaurants even from a branding perspective. But if you own 90% of the options on that appear on a delivery app, then there's a lot less chance of someone clicking on something that doesn't belong to you.

Very humbling moment watching this video for the first time, hearing the words "Tender Shack" and having a crime drama-style flashback to all the times I had ordered from them assuming I was supporting a local business and not just Secret Chili's. Nobody is immune to getting played by big corpo, and if you think you are you probably already have been and just never realized

Its gotten to the point where if Im on a delivery service and I see a restaurant in my area I dont recognize but maybe sounds good, I run the address thru google. And 95% of them are ghost kitchens. I wont buy from them.

DUDE The WSJ just ran an article about Uber Eats reforming its ghost kitchen brand policies and the reporter mentioned this video! 🎉 You're doing investigative journalism dude!

As of today, DoorDash now has virtual kitchens labeled. Eddy, you are the ultimate influencer 🤣

I worked as a hostess at Chilis, and I had many Uber Eats drivers come in and ask for a place called "It's just wings." I would be so confused, and so would the driver. I had one person say they were driving around for about 15 minutes looking for a wings place, only to be greeted by a location for a chili's. And for anyone wondering why Mangianos Italian food is coming out of a Chili's kitchen, it's because Binker, the company that owns Chili's, also owns Mangianos. I also worked in To-go in the chilis sometimes, so I had to pack the wings. The wings for Its Just Wings are exactly the same for the Nascar Fuel wings.

I dont think Eddy realizes how influential AND re-watchable this video is. People come back STILL to watch this and people are getting likes from days ago. Eddy, this is genuinely one of the best video essays I've ever seen. Amazing content.