{"id":166652,"date":"2026-03-17T21:37:36","date_gmt":"2026-03-17T21:37:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/166652\/"},"modified":"2026-03-17T21:37:36","modified_gmt":"2026-03-17T21:37:36","slug":"popular-brooklyn-bbq-restaurant-fights-back-against-steep-delivery-app-commissions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/166652\/","title":{"rendered":"Popular Brooklyn BBQ restaurant fights back against steep delivery app commissions"},"content":{"rendered":"

Restaurant owners hate 30% commissions that delivery services like DoorDash, Grubhub and Uber Eats <\/a>charge them for many orders. But now, one very popular New York City spot is fighting back.<\/p>\n

Morgan\u2019s Brooklyn Barbecue<\/a>, widely regarded as one of the city\u2019s best places for Texas-style, dry-rub grilling, encourages its customers to put in orders through the restaurant\u2019s own web sites and app \u2013 not the big tech services.<\/p>\n

Morgan\u2019s at 267 Flatbush Ave., a few blocks from the Barclays Center on a corner where Prospect Heights and Park Slope converge, is a pioneer in the trend. Matthew Glazier, owner of the thriving spot with a cozy rustic interior and bustling sidewalk terrace, said that since he set up a dedicated app six months ago, orders placed directly by customers increased from 5% to 15% of all of Morgan\u2019s deliveries.\u00a0<\/p>\n

And he\u2019s shooting for 50% eventually, although he knows that won\u2019t happen overnight.<\/p>\n

Morgan\u2019s Brooklyn Barbecue owner Matthew Glazier. Paul Martinka for New York Post<\/p>\n

Glazier said delivery app companies wouldn\u2019t budge on the 30% commissions they were charging him.<\/p>\n

He \u201ctried to negotiate, but I get nowhere even though we are high-volume,\u201d said the restaurateur.<\/p>\n

Glazier still uses Uber Eats and Grubhub, but recently decided to prioritize taking orders straight from customers.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlthough we [previously] took orders on our own site, we doubled down about six months ago to really focus on this,\u201d he said. \u201cWe try to increase the percentage of direct orders with e-mail blasts to our customers through a platform we use called owner.com. We also put messages in bags reminding them they can order from us directly.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen people place orders through our site or the app, the information goes to Uber Eats or DoorDash, which handle deliveries for us,\u201d Glazier explained. \u201cThey charge us a $3.99 fee, but it\u2019s much less than 30%.\u201d<\/p>\n

The restaurant, a few blocks from the Barclays Center, encourages its customers to put in orders through the restaurant\u2019s own web sites and app \u2013 not the big tech services. Paul Martinka for New York Post<\/p>\n

Morgan\u2019s is widely regarded as one of the city\u2019s best places for Texas-style, dry-rub grilling. Executive Chef Cenobio Canalizo, above. Paul Martinka for New York Post<\/p>\n

Asked for comment Tuesday, a Grubhub spokesman said,\u00a0\u201cGrubhub wants restaurants to succeed no matter what channel they use, because when they win, we win.\u201d<\/p>\n

Morgan\u2019s is one of the city\u2019s top barbecue places, where longtime chef Cenobio Canalizo mans the big, red, wood-fueled smoker from Mesquite, Tex. Its dry-rub menu is famous for a \u201choly trinity smoker plate\u201d of brisket, house-smoked sausage, pork ribs and cornbread.<\/p>\n

Eater.com critic Robert Sietsema wrote<\/a> that Morgan\u2019s ranks with \u201cgreat barbecues, up there with Hometown, Hill Country and John Brown.\u201d The Infatuation calls it<\/a> \u201cone of the great places to spend some quality time with your inner neanderthal.\u201d<\/p>\n

Glazier estimates the business is 60% take-out and delivery versus 40% eating in. The Holy Trinity Smoke Plate, above. Paul Martinka for New York Post<\/p>\n

But Morgan\u2019s became a victim of its own success. As its fame spread to distant parts of town and beyond, many more customers than before ordered home delivery from farther afield, putting a strain on the kitchen \u2013 and cheating the place of nearly one-third of the value of every order.<\/p>\n

What Glazier called \u201ca different source of revenue than butts in seats\u201d of course took on much greater importance during the pandemic. Before Covid hit, Glazier\u2019s business was 90% dine-in and only 10% orders.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow I\u2019d say we\u2019re 60% take-out and delivery versus 40% eating in. It was up to 70% a few weeks ago when we were in the Arctic,\u201d he joked about this year\u2019s brutal cold-weather snap<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Before COVID hit, Glazier\u2019s business was 90% dine-in and only 10% orders. Above, fried chicken sandwich. Paul Martinka for New York Post<\/p>\n

\u201cWe built something people come from across the city for,\u201d Glazier said. \u201cThe question was always, why make them come to us?<\/p>\n

\u201cExpanding our delivery radius is just us meeting our customers where they are. The barbecue found its audience long before the delivery radius did. We\u2019re just catching up.\u201d<\/p>\n

DoorDash and Uber Eats did not immediately answer requests for comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Restaurant owners hate 30% commissions that delivery services like DoorDash, Grubhub and Uber Eats charge them for many…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":166653,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[98,100,99,288,6708,289,35407,9,24,63,1491,3274,821],"class_list":["post-166652","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn-headlines","tag-brooklyn-news","tag-business","tag-covid-vaccine","tag-food-drink","tag-food-delivery","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-real-estate","tag-realty-check","tag-restaurants"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166652","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=166652"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166652\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/166653"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=166652"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=166652"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=166652"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}