Restaurant marketing

DoorDash Optimization for Restaurants: A Canadian Operator's Direct-Ordering Recovery Plan

15+ years in local marketing; Google Ads certified; Shopify Partner.

Here's a scenario I see constantly with independent Canadian operators. You open your DoorDash merchant dashboard on a Tuesday morning, look at last month's numbers, and realize you did $40,000 in delivery sales. Good month. Then you see the commission line. DoorDash took somewhere between $10,000 and $12,000 of it. And you're sitting there thinking: I cooked every one of those orders. My staff packed every one of those bags. DoorDash drove a car.

That's the math Canadian operators are living with right now. And it's not getting better on its own.

This article is specifically about DoorDash optimization for restaurants, meaning how to use the platform without getting eaten alive by it, how to build a direct-ordering channel alongside it, and how to stop renting your customer base from a third party. I'll also cover SkipTheDishes and Uber Eats where the logic applies, because the commission problem isn't DoorDash-specific. It's platform-wide.

What this article won't cover in depth: the full picture of restaurant marketing channels, which lives in our complete guide to restaurant marketing Canada. And if you're dealing with the nightmare of menu prices being wrong across five different platforms, that's a separate problem with its own fix, covered in our POS-to-DoorDash menu sync guide.

The Commission Math, Done Honestly

Let me just do the numbers plainly, because I think operators often know this is bad without knowing exactly how bad.

DoorDash charges Canadian restaurants roughly 15-30% commission depending on the plan tier. The basic plan sits around 15%, the "Plus" plan is around 25%, and the "Premier" plan is around 30%. Most operators who want to appear in DoorDash's main search results and promotions end up on Plus or Premier. That's the 25-30% range.

So: assume you do $50,000/month in DoorDash sales on the Premier plan.

Commission at 30%: $15,000/month goes to DoorDash
Remaining: $35,000 before your food cost, labour, packaging, and overhead
If your food cost is 30% of sales, that's another $15,000 off
Labour on those orders, say 20%: another $10,000
You're left with roughly $10,000 on $50,000 in sales

That's a 20% net margin on delivery before rent, utilities, and marketing. In a good-margin restaurant, you might see 10-15% net overall. Delivery through DoorDash at full commission rates pushes you below that for every single order that comes through the app.

A pizzeria owner in Saskatoon put it plainly: "I made $48K in DoorDash sales last month and DoorDash kept $14K. I literally can't make the math work on delivery anymore."

That's not a complaint about DoorDash being a bad product. DoorDash works. People use it. The problem is the margin math at scale, and the fact that every customer who orders through DoorDash belongs to DoorDash, not to you.

Restaurants Canada estimated in 2024 that third-party delivery commissions cost the Canadian foodservice industry over $1 billion annually. That's not an abstraction. That's money that came out of Canadian kitchens and went to platform companies.

What "DoorDash Optimization" Actually Means (And What It Doesn't)

When people search for DoorDash optimization for restaurants, they usually mean one of two things:

How do I get more orders through DoorDash?
How do I stop losing so much margin to DoorDash?

These are almost opposite goals. And I think most of the advice out there focuses on the first one, because DoorDash's own resources obviously want you to sell more through DoorDash. More volume for them means more commission for them.

I'm going to focus on both, but in a specific order: first, make sure your DoorDash listing is actually working correctly. Then, build the off-ramp.

Getting Your DoorDash Listing Right (The Basics You'd Be Surprised Operators Miss)

Before you worry about driving more volume, make sure your listing isn't actively costing you customers.

Photos. DoorDash listings with high-quality photos of actual menu items convert better than listings with stock photos or no photos. This isn't a guess. DoorDash's own merchant resources say photo-rich listings see higher order rates. If your listing has blurry photos the driver took on day one, that's a fixable problem this week.

Menu accuracy. If your DoorDash menu has items that are 86'd, wrong prices, or descriptions that don't match what you're actually serving, you're setting yourself up for refund requests and bad reviews. A 1-star review that says "ordered the mushroom risotto and got told it wasn't available" is a marketing problem, not a kitchen problem. The kitchen did nothing wrong. The menu sync did.

For a complete breakdown of how to get your menu synced across DoorDash, SkipTheDishes, and Uber Eats without logging into five portals, see our source-of-truth menu integration guide.

Competitor ghost-listing. This is underreported and genuinely annoying. Some DoorDash map pins show competitor restaurants promoted on your listing. You can't always prevent this, but you can flag it through the merchant portal. Check your listing from a customer account periodically. You'd be surprised what's showing up on your own page.

Response time and acceptance rate. DoorDash's algorithm rewards restaurants that accept orders quickly and have low cancellation rates. If your kitchen is slammed and you're cancelling 1 in 8 DoorDash orders during dinner rush, your placement in search results takes a hit. Pause the tablet during peak if you need to, rather than cancelling orders after they come in.

The Direct-Ordering Off-Ramp: How to Build It Without Burning the Platform

Here's the thing: I'm not suggesting you delete your DoorDash account. That's not realistic for most operators, especially in markets where DoorDash or SkipTheDishes drives significant discovery. In the Prairies specifically, SkipTheDishes (which is Canadian-built and headquartered in Winnipeg) has strong market share in cities like Regina, Saskatoon, and Winnipeg. In Toronto and Vancouver, DoorDash is dominant. You probably need to be on these platforms for visibility.

The goal isn't to leave DoorDash. The goal is to convert DoorDash customers into direct customers over time.

Here's how that works in practice.

Step 1: Get a Direct Online Ordering System That You Actually Own

You need a first-party ordering page. This can be built through your POS (Toast, Square, TouchBistro, Lightspeed all have online ordering modules), or through a standalone platform like GloriaFood, ChowNow, or BentoBox.

The economics are completely different. Direct ordering platforms typically charge 0-3.5% per order, versus 25-30% on DoorDash. On a $50 order, that's a $1.75 processing fee versus a $12.50-$15.00 commission. The customer data, the email address, the order history, all of that belongs to you.

For a full comparison of which direct ordering platform makes sense for your setup, see our breakdown of online ordering options for Canadian restaurants.

Step 2: Give Customers a Reason to Order Direct

This is the piece most operators skip. You can't just put a "order direct" button on your website and hope people find it. You need to make it worth their while.

The most common approach is a small discount or a perk for direct orders. "Order directly through our website and skip the service fee" is honest and effective. Customers on DoorDash pay a service fee on top of the inflated menu prices most operators set to offset commissions. Ordering direct is genuinely cheaper for them. You just have to tell them that.

A bag insert is one of the simplest tools here. Every DoorDash order that leaves your kitchen can include a card that says something like: "Next time, order direct at [yourwebsite.com] and save $3. We get to keep more of it too." That's not against DoorDash's terms of service. You're not telling them to leave DoorDash. You're just offering a direct option.

Step 3: Capture the Email or Phone Number

A direct order gives you the customer's contact information. That's the whole point. Once you have it, you can market to them directly, which costs you almost nothing compared to the commission you'd pay on their next order.

This is where a loyalty program or a simple email list becomes a margin strategy, not just a marketing tactic. If a customer orders from you directly six times a year, and each order is $45, that's $270 in direct revenue. At 2% processing versus 28% commission, you're keeping roughly $70 more per customer per year just by having the direct relationship.

Our restaurant loyalty program guide goes deep on how to build this without a complicated tech stack.

And if you're building an email or SMS list from those direct orders, make sure you're doing it in compliance with CASL (Canada's Anti-Spam Legislation). Express consent, clear identification, and a working unsubscribe mechanism are required. Fines start at $1M per violation. This isn't something to wing. Our restaurant email and SMS marketing guide covers the compliance side properly.

A Week-by-Week Build Plan for the First Month

This is the part where I want to be specific about the actual work, because "build a direct ordering channel" sounds simple and the execution is where operators get stuck.

Week 1: Audit your current DoorDash listing

Log in as a customer. Order from your own restaurant. Check: Are photos current? Are prices accurate? Are items available that you've 86'd? Is your address and hours correct? Does the listing show competitor promotions?

Fix everything you find. This takes 2-4 hours for most operators.

Also pull your DoorDash merchant dashboard and look at your commission plan. If you're on Premier at 30% and you're not getting meaningful incremental volume from the platform features, call your DoorDash rep and ask about moving to a lower tier. Some operators negotiate. It's worth asking.

Week 2: Set up or confirm your direct ordering page

If you already have a website with online ordering, great. Test it. Place an order yourself. Make sure it works on mobile (most of your customers are ordering on their phones). Make sure the menu is current and matches your DoorDash menu.

If you don't have direct online ordering, this week is when you set it up. GloriaFood has a free tier. Square Online is free to start. Toast and TouchBistro have online ordering modules if you're already on those POS systems. Pick one and get it live.

Week 3: Build the off-ramp materials

Design a simple bag insert. It doesn't need to be fancy. A 4x6 card with your website URL, a direct-order incentive ("save $3 on your next order"), and a QR code. Bryce can do this in a day. Print 500 of them. Put one in every delivery bag.

Update your Google Business Profile to include your direct ordering link. This is free and takes 10 minutes. If you're not sure how your Google Business Profile is set up, our restaurant local SEO guide covers this in detail.

Update your Instagram bio link to your direct ordering page, not your DoorDash page.

Week 4: Start capturing and using customer data

Look at the orders that came through your direct ordering page this month. How many email addresses did you capture? Set up a simple welcome email for new direct-order customers. Thank them for ordering. Tell them about your next special. This is the beginning of a customer relationship you actually own.

If you're in Saskatchewan or Manitoba, SkipTheDishes is likely your dominant third-party platform, not DoorDash. The same logic applies. Run this same process for your Skip listing. The commission structure is similar and the off-ramp strategy is identical.

The SkipTheDishes Variable (And Why Prairie Operators Need to Think About This Differently)

I want to flag something specific for operators in Saskatchewan, Manitoba, and smaller Prairie cities. SkipTheDishes is Canadian-built, Winnipeg-headquartered, and has significantly stronger market penetration in Prairie markets than DoorDash does. In Regina or Saskatoon, your Skip volume might dwarf your DoorDash volume.

The commission math on Skip is similar. The optimization principles are the same. But the discovery dynamic is different. In a smaller city, Skip might be how a significant percentage of your new customers find you for the first time. Pulling back from Skip aggressively in a Prairie market can hurt discovery in a way that's less of a risk in Toronto or Vancouver, where Google Maps and organic search carry more of the discovery load.

I think the honest answer for Prairie operators is: stay on Skip for discovery, but build the direct-order relationship harder. The bag insert, the loyalty program, the email capture. Every Skip customer is a potential direct customer on their next order.

For operators in Toronto or Vancouver, DoorDash dominates and the off-ramp strategy works the same way, but you have more Google search volume to lean on as a discovery alternative. Our restaurant Google Ads guide covers how to use paid search to capture delivery-intent customers before they ever open the DoorDash app.

What to Do About Reviews That Aren't Your Fault

One more thing I want to address here because it comes up constantly with delivery optimization.

A fast-casual owner in Calgary described it well: "We got a 1-star review from a guy whose Uber Eats driver dropped his food in the snow. The driver works for Uber. The review is on Google. Nobody can explain why this is my problem."

It is your problem, unfortunately. Not because you did anything wrong, but because the review is on your Google Business Profile and it affects your rating. And your Google rating affects whether new customers choose you, which affects revenue.

The fix is not to argue with the reviewer publicly. The fix is to respond professionally, acknowledge the experience, and explain what you can control. Something like: "We're sorry this happened. Delivery issues with the driver are outside our kitchen, but we understand the experience reflects on us. Please contact us directly and we'll make it right."

Then flag the review to Google as a delivery-related issue. Google has improved their review removal process for reviews that describe third-party delivery problems, though it's not guaranteed.

This is a reputation management problem as much as a delivery problem. Our restaurant reputation management guide covers the full response playbook, including how to handle reviews that describe situations outside your control.

The Three Things to Take Away From This

One: DoorDash optimization isn't about getting more DoorDash orders. It's about making your listing work correctly, then building a parallel channel that costs you 2% instead of 28%.

Two: The bag insert is the simplest tool most operators aren't using. Every delivery order is a chance to introduce a customer to your direct ordering page. You're already paying to cook the food. The card costs pennies.

Three: The customer relationship is the asset. DoorDash has your customer's data. You have a commission bill. The whole point of this recovery plan is to flip that equation over time, one direct order at a time.

If you want to see how this fits into a broader marketing approach, including SEO, social, and loyalty, our complete restaurant marketing Canada playbook covers the full picture.