DoorDash isn’t only a restaurant delivery app. You can get delivery from a convenience store or a local DashMart, Petco delivers some orders via DoorDash.
And DoorDash partners with many national grocery stores and retailers to offer same-day delivery.
If you’re a Dasher, you may have seen this order type pop up: “Shop and deliver”
With a shop and deliver orders, you’ll go into stores to pick out items and purchase them with the Red Card, then deliver the completed order to customers.
A shop and deliver request
It’s an earnings opportunity that’s quite different from typical restaurant orders, so you won’t be surprised that reactions from Dashers are mixed.
Read more to learn how shop and deliver orders work, how much you can make, and how to maximize your earnings.
What are Shop and Deliver orders on DoorDash?
Shop and Deliver is an order type on DoorDash where Dashers visit grocery and retail stores to pick out items, pay for them with the Red Card, then deliver the order to the customer. It’s similar to shopping for Instacart.
Major partnered stores that are eligible for shop and deliver include CVS, Walgreens, Office Depot, 7/11, and Safeway.
The order request screen displays the store name, the number of items, total estimated pay, and total estimated miles.
You must have an active Red Card to be eligible to receive shop and deliver orders.
How to opt out of shop and deliver orders
To opt out of shop and deliver orders, contact DoorDash and ask to be removed from the program.
How much do shop and deliver orders pay?
The pay formula for shop and deliver orders is the same as other orders: Base pay + promotions + tips.
Dashers have found that base pay for shop and deliver orders tends to be higher, but you need to balance the additional pay with the extra time it may take to shop for all of the items.
Like other DoorDash order, the request screen for shop and deliver gives you enough information to give you a good sense for overall pay.
After the order is done you’ll be able to see how much of the payout was from base pay, and how much was from tips.
Examples payouts for shop and deliver orders
The order below is a $9.50 payout for 5 items, and only a 0.9 mile delivery. That’s a solid order that shouldn’t take too much time.
A great order if you can get the shopping done quickly. Credit default_redditor1 on Reddit
Below is a great shop and deliver order. It paid $15.75 for only a single item. Base pay was $10.75 and the tip was $5.
$15.75 for one item! Credit marcopolo293 on reddit
To give an example of a lower payout, here’s an order for only $3.75. There is only 1 item on the order and the delivery distance is short, but the extra steps involved with shop and deliver might not make this worth it. You can easily get $3.75 just to pick up a bag of fast food.
Not a great payout. Credit hornycashew on Reddit
The order below shows why tips are so important for a shop & deliver. The base pay for a huge order was only $2.25, but a massive tip over $70 made it worth it.
Without a massive tip this order would not be worth it
“You are prioritized for shop & deliver orders”
After completing several shop & deliver orders, you might get a notice that you are now prioritized to receive more shop & deliver orders.
That means that you’ll get more shop & deliver orders than the average shopper. If you want to opt out of being prioritized, click the button in the notification and fill out the form.
If you change your mind later, you can update your status and let DoorDash know that you to be prioritized for shop & deliver orders again.
Getting prioritized for shop & deliver orders is good news for some Dashers
What it’s like to do a shop and deliver order: The process
After you accept a shop and deliver order, navigate to the store and mark that you are beginning the delivery. The app will display a list of items, along with aisle locations.
Locate the items and scan the barcode to mark that you picked it out. If the item is out of stock, you may be able to pick out a replacement. More on that below.
Once you have all the items, head to the checkout area and use your Red Card to pay for the order. You may receive other instructions, like taking a photo of the receipt.
Once you’re out of the store, navigate to the customer and drop off the order according to the drop-off instructions.
Remember that you can only receive shop and deliver orders if you have an active red card, so if you don’t, order a new one in the Dasher app.
Substitutions & replacements: What to do when items are out of stock
If all goes well, you will be able to pick out exactly what the customer wants. But often, an item will be out of stock and you may have to pick a replacement item.
Replacements are one of the more challenging parts of being a shopper. It’s one of the biggest friction points, causing slowdowns, miscommunications, and potentially upset customers.
The DoorDash app allows customers to select potential replacements, or gives them the option for no replacements. If the customer does not want a replacement, you can select an item as missing and move on.
If the customer has selected a specific replacement and you can find it, scanning the replacement into the app is not too hard. However, some shoppers report issues with scanning replacements.
But if the customer wants replacements but hasn’t picked a specific one, it’s up to you to find a good replacement and communicate with the customer.
Customers expect a seamless experience and may not be prepared to respond to a text or a call. If you don’t get a response, use your best judgement to either replace or refund the item.
How Dashers feel about doing replacements
“[Replacements] are a very easy process and it’s very easy to make changes to the customers order in the app when some thing is unavailable.”
“It’s a lot easier now that you can make substitutions or refund an item yourself in the app.”
“Texting customers about substitutions is a crapshoot, and I will not call them because they often act like they don’t know who I am and why I’m calling them”
“Texting customers is the biggest lol ever. They never respond and so I end up calling. They then respond in a bitchy tone at best and I have to sit there and figure out what flavor of Crest is palatable enough for them”
Is shop and deliver the same as DashMart and other orders?
Shop and deliver orders are different from DashMart orders, Petco orders, and other retail orders. Orders on DashMart and Petco are prepared for you by store staff. You don’t have to do any shopping, and you don’t have to pay with the Red Card.
Other order types on DoorDash
Shop-only orders: Shop for items that customers will pick up later
DoorDash also offers shop-only orders that don’t require you to deliver the items.
Here’s how a shop-only order works: You shop for a list items, label the bags, then place the bags on shelves for the customer to pick up at a later time.
You don’t have to deliver the items on a shop-only order
Just like other shop & deliver orders, shop-only orders show you an upfront pay estimate that includes base pay from DoorDash and some or all of any tip left by the customer.
You can use the app to communicate with the customer about replacements and substitutions.
Shop-only orders have a time limit that can look short, but you’ll still be paid the same amount even if you go over the limit.
DoorDash shop and deliver vs shopping for Instacart
Shop and deliver on DoorDash sounds nearly identical to shopping for Instacart, but there are a few key differences.
The main difference is average order size and location: Instacart orders are typically larger orders at grocery stores, while shop and deliver is usually small orders at drugstores or other home supply stores.
So when you’re doing shopping and delivery for DoorDash, you don’t typically have to do large, family-sized grocery orders. Expect orders to be smaller on DoorDash.
One Dasher said, “With DoorDash it’s always about 3–5 easy to find items with nice pay and nice tip. With Instacart it’s a 25 to 50 item order with no tip to maybe $2.”
More about Instacart
Strategies
Optimizing shop and deliver orders isn’t too different from regular DoorDash orders: Come up with payout standards and stick to them.
Look for orders with strong numbers: Good payout, not too many items, and not too many miles.
You want to minimize your time in the store and minimize complications. If you find that certain stores take too long to shop in, skip orders from that store in the future.
Figure out your replacement strategy. Communicating with the customer about replacements can cause delays, which eats into your earnings.
The experts on replacements are Instacart shoppers. Most fall into two camps: Find a logical replacement and move on without getting confirmation from the customer, or don’t do replacements unless the customer states a specific one. Choose your replacement style and stick to it.
It’s also a good idea to use shop and deliver orders to give yourself a much-needed change of pace if restaurant deliveries are getting too repetitive.
Quotes from Dashers
“Shop and delivers are the best orders to take. Higher base pay and much faster to complete”
“They always have such good pay and they’re easy for Walgreens, CVS”
“If I won’t shop for Instacart for $7 plus $2 tip I’m not going to Dollar General for DD for $7.75”
“Shop orders are an auto decline for me”
“I like the change of pace, I like getting to walk around for a little while”
More reading for Dashers
Tracy says
I’m just starting with Door Dash and have a question for you about using the Red Card to pay for shop and deliver orders. Does this mean that I’m paying with my own funds and will be reimbursed later, or does this work some other way?
Doug H says
You will not be paying with your own funds when you do a Red Card order. The Red Card is DoorDash funds, so you don’t have to worry about being reimbursed.
Susan says
I am a relatively new Dasher and have received mixed messages about replacements. It is my understanding that any replacement hast to go through the Dasher app, and I need to scan the barcode. I was told this by customer service. However, I read that if the customer authorizes a replacement either verbally to me or by text, I’m allowed to replace it, even though I can’t scan it. What is the real story here?
Doug H says
There are definitely still some design problems with the replacement system and there isn’t actually one great answer for this. But the main issue is that if you can’t scan an item, you run the risk of your red card being rejected at checkout because the expected total doesn’t match the actual total. Some dashers say that if the unscannable replacement is a similar cost to the missing item, you can mark the original item as added and buy the replacement.
It’s not as good of a system as instacart, and a lot of shoppers end up refunding items rather than dealing with replacements. Which isn’t a great experience for the customer, but you can put most of the blame for that on DoorDash!
SadDoordasher says
You might have to rewrite this. A lot if this has changed. I haven’t seen base pay go above $6.50 and that was for a 26 item order, 5 miles away at a meijer. So looks like the test phase is over in our market and they no longer give higher pay based on item count which they should as the more items the longer it takes. So guess I won’t be doing anymore shop and delivers. It’s kinda sad, I loved doing them, but not getting paid Peanuts to do it.
Doug H says
Thanks for the comment. What other parts of the article look inaccurate to you?
Doordasher says
Shop and pay orders do not require 50% acceptance rate