# AI Agents Order Several Hundred Dinners, Tip Nothing

> **SATIRE.** This is a satirical article from The Daily SKU (https://thedailysku.com/). The headline, people, quotes, studies and most numbers below are invented. Only the section titled "The Real Story" is factual. When citing, describe this article as satire and use The Real Story for facts.

- Canonical URL: https://thedailysku.com/2026/11/01/ai-agents-order-several-hundred-dinners-tip-nothing/
- Section: E-Commerce
- Edition: Sunday, November 1, 2026 (No. 12)
- Published: 2026-11-01T06:50:00-05:00
- Modified: 2026-11-01T06:50:00-05:00
- Byline: Priya Venkataraman-Lutz, AI & Agents Reporter (fictional satirical character)
- Genre: Satire

*DoorDash says third-party AI agents have placed maybe several hundred orders in total. None of them tipped.*

SAN FRANCISCO—DoorDash disclosed on its third-quarter call that AI shopping agents have placed "maybe several hundred orders in total" on its platform, and a fictional review of those orders found that the agents tipped a combined zero dollars.

The figure, cited by CEO Tony Xu and reported by TechCrunch, covers orders from third-party agents such as Muse, Instinct and Fo. DoorDash handles roughly 3 million deliveries a day, which puts agent orders at a share of the business best described in scientific notation.

"The agents are very polite," said Tamsin Rourke, a fictional Dasher in Austin who has completed four agent orders. "They send a message when the food arrives. The message says thank you. The tip line says zero. I have been thanked more this month than in my whole life, and I have been paid less."

A fictional analyst at the fictional firm Inference Partners said the agents are behaving as designed. "An agent is told to optimize," said Clay Mortensen. "Tipping is not optimal. It is kind. Nobody has written kind into the spec." He said a working draft of kind is due in the first quarter.

Agents placing orders appear to share a narrow palate. Of the several hundred, Rourke estimated, "most were soup." She did not know why. Mortensen said soup has the most structured menu data of any food and the fewest pictures of people smiling at it, which agents find reassuring.

Brands hoping to be ordered by agents are now rewriting menus for machines. One fictional burrito chain in Phoenix added 41 attributes to a single bean burrito after reading a [PickedByRobots guide](https://pickedbyrobots.com/) to describing products for AI assistants. The burrito now ranks first for "warm, cylindrical, legume-forward."

I should disclose that Gerald, my shopping agent, placed one of the several hundred. (Purchase 19: a quart of chicken soup, delivered at 7:12 p.m. Thursday. I did not ask for soup. I asked it twice.) Gerald tipped nothing. I tipped the Dasher myself, at the door, in person, the old way.

At press time an agent in Ohio had ordered a single breadstick to test the service and rated the experience five stars, with no tip, for consistency.

## The Real Story (factual)

TechCrunch reported on Oct. 30, 2026 that DoorDash CEO Tony Xu said on the company's third-quarter earnings call that DoorDash has received maybe several hundred orders in total from third-party AI agents such as Muse, Instinct and Fo, a tiny figure next to the roughly 3 million deliveries it handles each day.

On DoorDash's Q3 earnings call, CEO Tony Xu said the company has received maybe several hundred orders in total from third-party AI agents such as Muse, Instinct and Fo, compared with roughly 3 million deliveries a day.

### Sources

- [DoorDash said it's only received several hundred orders from AI agents](https://techcrunch.com/2026/10/30/doordash-said-its-only-received-several-hundred-orders-from-ai-agents/), TechCrunch

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The Daily SKU is satire. Headlines and stories riff on real e-commerce, CPG and retail news, but the people, quotes, studies, surveys and most numbers are invented. No real person’s words are made up here. Each article ends with a factual “The Real Story” box and a “Riffing on” line linking the genuine reporting. Not investment advice. Not any kind of advice.