EMILY (West Village, 35 Downing St, Manhattan) — Italian / Pizza. Case study #24. Prices compared between Emily’s own first-party ordering site and the same restaurant’s Uber Eats storefront, both for the 35 Downing St location, captured the same day.
Order Emily’s vodka pizza — the pink pie that made this Detroit-style square famous — for pickup from the West Village shop on Emily’s own website and it is $20.00. Order the same pizza, from the same oven, delivered on Uber Eats and it is… $20.00. The Emily pizza with truffle and honey is $27.50 either way; the pepperoni-heavy Roni Supreme is $26.50 either way; the Emmy double-stack burger with fries, $32.00 either way. We priced 31 of Emily’s items side by side, across pizzas, plates and sandwiches, and every single one carried the same price on Uber Eats as on the restaurant’s own site. The average markup was zero.
What makes that notable is where the two prices come from. In most of the restaurants this series has checked, the “first-party” menu is a white-label storefront built on the same platform that runs the delivery marketplace. Emily’s is not: its ordering site is its own, and Uber Eats is a separate company. Two independent channels, 31 items, one price each. Emily does not raise its menu for the delivery customer — which means, as the numbers below show, that the restaurant is the one absorbing Uber’s commission.
The markup
Across the 31 matched items the delivery markup was 0% — mean, median and range all zero. A basket of all 31 items costs $652.00 on Emily’s own site and the identical $652.00 to have delivered on Uber Eats. There is no gentle treatment for the cheap items and no steeper one for the expensive pies: a $9.00 side of waffle fries, a $20.00 classic red pie, a $28.00 Ezzo and a $32.00 burger are all listed at exactly the counter price on the app. This is the same pattern this series has found at Motorino, Boqueria and Van Leeuwen — a flat, honest transfer of the menu to the app with nothing added — but at Emily it is measured against the restaurant’s own independent website rather than a platform-built storefront, which makes the parity all the more striking.
What the restaurant nets
Here is why a 0% markup is the whole story. When a customer orders delivery through Uber Eats, the platform keeps a commission on the sale. To come out level with a walk-in, a restaurant would need to mark its delivery menu up by about +42.9% at Uber’s top 30% commission — or about +17.6% even at New York’s capped 15%. Emily marks up nothing. So the math runs entirely against the restaurant: apply a 30% commission to the $652.00 delivery basket and Emily keeps about $456.40 — roughly $196 less than the $652.00 the same food brings in at its own counter. Even at New York’s capped 15% rate it nets about $554.20, still about $98 less than the counter. On all 31 of the 31 items — every one — the restaurant nets less selling through Uber than selling the same dish across its own counter. This is the pattern this series calls absorbing (Type B): the customer pays exactly the restaurant’s price, and the restaurant quietly eats Uber’s commission out of its own margin.
Why it still lands on Uber
Emily sets its own menu prices; Uber does not. But Uber sets the commission, and a restaurant that chooses not to pass it on is choosing to absorb it. Most restaurants in this series lift their delivery menus to recover Uber’s cut, in whole or in part; Emily has declined to, holding its Uber prices at its website prices to the dollar. That protects the delivery customer and squeezes the kitchen. It does not make the fees disappear: on top of these identical menu prices, Uber still charges the delivery customer a delivery fee, a service fee and tax at checkout — none of which appear in the figures above, because they require a logged-in order to see. Uber also reports to merchants a “Menu Markup” metric measuring the gap between a restaurant’s in-store and in-app prices; at Emily that gap is zero, which means the commission comes almost entirely out of the restaurant.
The New York context
New York City caps the core commission a delivery app can charge a restaurant at 15% for delivery, plus 5% for other listing and marketing services and 3% for card processing — limits the City Council first made permanent in 2021. A 2025 amendment, signed into law after the platforms sued and settled, now lets restaurants opt to pay an additional up to 20% for “enhanced services” such as wider delivery zones and top-of-search placement, which can push the total a restaurant chooses to pay toward roughly 43%. None of those caps require a restaurant to raise its menu prices — and Emily has not raised a single one. Whatever commission tier applies to this store, the restaurant is recovering none of it from the delivery customer. The Mayor’s Department of Consumer and Worker Protection continues to review delivery-app fees.
| Item | Counter / first-party | Uber Eats | Markup | Shop nets @30% (vs counter) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Red Pizzas | ||||
| The Ezzo (Sixer) | $28.00 | $28.00 | +0% | $19.60 (-8.40) |
| Roni Supreme (Sixer) | $26.50 | $26.50 | +0% | $18.55 (-7.95) |
| The Ezzo – Skinny Square | $26.00 | $26.00 | +0% | $18.20 (-7.80) |
| Roni Supreme – Skinny Square | $24.50 | $24.50 | +0% | $17.15 (-7.35) |
| Meatsiah (Sixer) | $24.50 | $24.50 | +0% | $17.15 (-7.35) |
| Meatsiah – Skinny Square | $22.50 | $22.50 | +0% | $15.75 (-6.75) |
| MVP (Sixer) | $21.50 | $21.50 | +0% | $15.05 (-6.45) |
| Deluxe (Sixer) | $21.50 | $21.50 | +0% | $15.05 (-6.45) |
| Classic (Sixer) | $19.50 | $19.50 | +0% | $13.65 (-5.85) |
| MVP – Skinny Square | $19.50 | $19.50 | +0% | $13.65 (-5.85) |
| Deluxe – Skinny Square | $19.50 | $19.50 | +0% | $13.65 (-5.85) |
| The Grammy (Sixer) | $18.50 | $18.50 | +0% | $12.95 (-5.55) |
| Classic – Skinny Square | $17.50 | $17.50 | +0% | $12.25 (-5.25) |
| The Grammy – Skinny Square | $16.50 | $16.50 | +0% | $11.55 (-4.95) |
| Pink Pizzas | ||||
| Arenstein (Sixer) | $25.00 | $25.00 | +0% | $17.50 (-7.50) |
| Arenstein – Skinny Square | $23.00 | $23.00 | +0% | $16.10 (-6.90) |
| Vodka Pizza (Sixer) | $20.00 | $20.00 | +0% | $14.00 (-6.00) |
| Vodka Pizza – Skinny Square | $18.00 | $18.00 | +0% | $12.60 (-5.40) |
| White Pizzas | ||||
| Emily Pizza (Sixer) | $27.50 | $27.50 | +0% | $19.25 (-8.25) |
| Emily Pizza – Skinny Square | $25.50 | $25.50 | +0% | $17.85 (-7.65) |
| Big Hawaiian (Sixer) | $22.50 | $22.50 | +0% | $15.75 (-6.75) |
| Big Hawaiian – Skinny Square | $20.50 | $20.50 | +0% | $14.35 (-6.15) |
| Plates | ||||
| Jumbo Wings | $22.00 | $22.00 | +0% | $15.40 (-6.60) |
| Brussels Sprouts Salad | $20.00 | $20.00 | +0% | $14.00 (-6.00) |
| OG Caesar Salad | $20.00 | $20.00 | +0% | $14.00 (-6.00) |
| Banh Mi Meatballs | $19.00 | $19.00 | +0% | $13.30 (-5.70) |
| Chicken Crunchers | $15.00 | $15.00 | +0% | $10.50 (-4.50) |
| Seasoned Waffle Fries | $9.00 | $9.00 | +0% | $6.30 (-2.70) |
| House Cured Olives | $8.00 | $8.00 | +0% | $5.60 (-2.40) |
| Handhelds | ||||
| The Emmy Double Stack Burger + Fries | $32.00 | $32.00 | +0% | $22.40 (-9.60) |
| Seoul Sister | $19.00 | $19.00 | +0% | $13.30 (-5.70) |
| All 31 matched items (basket) | $652.00 | $652.00 | +0% | $456.40 (-195.60) |
By the numbers
- Items matched: 31 (same description and portion, same 35 Downing St location; limited-time “World Cup” themed pizzas, add-on-priced items, and any item we could not confirm to the dollar on both platforms were excluded)
- Delivery markup: mean 0%, median 0%, range 0% to 0% — every item priced identically on both platforms
- Basket: $652.00 on Emily’s own site, $652.00 delivered on Uber Eats (identical)
- The two channels are independent: Emily’s own ordering site (order.pizzalovesemily.com) versus Uber Eats, a separate company
- Break-even markup at a 30% commission: +42.9% — Emily’s 0% is a long way below it
- What the restaurant nets: about $456.40 on the basket at a 30% commission (~$196 less than counter); about $554.20 even at New York’s capped 15% (~$98 less)
- Items on which the restaurant nets less than dine-in: 31 of 31 at a 30% commission; 31 of 31 at New York’s capped 15%
- Story type: B (absorbing) — the customer pays the counter price; the restaurant absorbs Uber’s commission
Method
On 15 July 2026, USA Times captured Emily’s own prices from its first-party online-ordering site (order.pizzalovesemily.com), set to Pickup for the Emily West Village store at 35 Downing St — the price a pickup customer pays at that counter, taken live from the ordering page on the day of capture rather than from any undatable menu image. The same day, we captured Uber Eats list prices for the same 35 Downing St store from the rendered storefront and matched them item by item against the first-party menu; every one of the 31 matched items was priced identically. We matched only items with the same description and portion (Emily’s round “Sixer” and half-dough “Skinny Square” pies are treated as the distinct items they are), used list prices rather than promotional prices, and excluded the limited-time “World Cup” themed pizzas, add-on-priced items such as the loaded fries, and any item we could not confirm to the dollar on both platforms. Because a logged-in checkout is required to see them, this automated audit did not capture the delivery fee, service fee, any New York regulatory fee, tax or tip a customer pays on top; the Uber figures reported are the storefront’s list prices for the food. We did not separately toggle the Uber storefront to pickup this run. The “shop nets” figures are an analytical estimate that applies a 30% (and, separately, New York’s capped 15%) commission to the Uber Eats price; they are our interpretation of the economics, not figures disclosed by Uber, and the true commission tier for this store is a private contract term that is not public. Prices can change and can vary by address; figures reflect the moment of capture.
Right of reply
USA Times contacted Emily and Uber for comment and will update this report with any response. Emily was told plainly that it is not the target of this story — and was asked the one question that decides it: after Uber’s commission, does it net more, less or the same as a walk-in, and is holding its Uber prices at its own website prices a deliberate choice. Uber was asked about its commission tiers in New York and whether it tracks the gap between in-store and in-app menu prices.
Sources
- Emily counter / first-party prices — Emily West Village online-ordering site (Pickup), captured 15 July 2026.
- Emily Uber Eats list prices — Emily – West Village on Uber Eats, captured 15 July 2026.
- NYC delivery fee caps and the 2025 amendment — NYC Department of Consumer and Worker Protection, delivery fee caps, reviewed July 2026.
This report is part of a USA Times series auditing food-delivery pricing. Prices were collected by USA Times on the date noted, compared item by item against the restaurant’s own current menu, and reviewed by an editor before publication.
