McDonald’s joins the Postmates lovefest, inks delivery deal in New York

McDonald’s is the latest fast food behemoth to hook up with Postmates, the three-year-old delivery startup itching to boost New York City’s average resting heart rate.

The deal was formally announced today, but it was pretty much public knowledge last month, around the time Chipotle inked a similar deal with Postmates. Still, the timing doesn’t really matter; Postmates delivers stuff to consumers with or without the consent of restaurants. What matters is that Postmates is slowly winning over major corporations and proving it can drive demand. This strategy is key to the startup’s future business model.

Today, Postmates charges its users to deliver stuff like burgers, burritos, and groceries. Slowly but surely, as businesses grow dependent on Postmates, they may eventually agree to eat the delivery fees — at least, that’s what Postmates’ execs tell us. With free delivery, the startup will win over more users, and may even threaten other lazy-food-tech giants, like Seamless-GrubHub.