Every Calgary restaurant owner considering delivery eventually has to answer the same question: list on the big aggregator apps, build something independent, or both. Here's an honest comparison of what each path actually costs and what it gets you.
Option 1: DoorDash / Uber Eats / Skip only
What you get: Instant access to an existing customer base already using the app, a built-in driver network, and zero setup work beyond a menu upload.
What it costs: Typically 15-30% commission per order, no ownership of the customer's contact info or order history, and full dependence on the aggregator's pricing, ranking algorithm, and driver availability in your specific neighborhood — which can be inconsistent for restaurants outside the busiest corridors.
Best for: Restaurants that want maximum reach with zero operational lift and can absorb the commission as a marketing cost.
Option 2: Build your own storefront and delivery from scratch
What you get: Full ownership of the customer relationship, your own pricing, and no per-order commission tax.
What it costs: Assembling and maintaining a website, a POS integration, a driver network or courier arrangement, and order-management tooling — usually four or five separate vendors that don't talk to each other, and hours of setup and ongoing admin that a small restaurant team doesn't have.
Best for: Restaurants with the staff and budget to manage a multi-vendor stack, or ghost-kitchen operators for whom delivery infrastructure is the whole business.
Option 3: A platform built specifically for independent restaurant delivery
What you get: A branded storefront, a POS with kitchen display integration, and a delivery network — in one system, with no per-vendor stitching required. This is the gap BuyNearby is built to fill: restaurants keep the customer relationship and pay a subscription plus a delivery fee rather than a 15-30% cut of every order, while still getting the reach and reliability of a dedicated driver network.
What it costs: A monthly subscription (BuyNearby's restaurant plans start at $50-140/mo depending on whether delivery and marketplace features are needed) instead of a per-order percentage — which means the economics get better, not worse, as order volume grows.
Best for: Independent restaurants that want to reduce aggregator dependence without taking on the operational burden of building delivery infrastructure themselves. It's also not all-or-nothing — BuyNearby's Platform Connect can sync your menu to DoorDash/Uber Eats/Skip too, so restaurants can run both in parallel while shifting volume toward the channel that keeps more margin.
The honest bottom line
If you're doing a handful of delivery orders a week and don't want to think about it, staying purely on an aggregator is a reasonable choice — the commission is effectively a marketing fee. Once delivery becomes a meaningful share of revenue, the math flips: a flat subscription plus a delivery fee almost always beats a 15-30% cut, and owning the customer relationship compounds over time in a way that renting space inside someone else's app never does.
Want to see the numbers for your specific order volume? Talk to us — we'll run the comparison honestly, aggregator fees included.