Lyft thinks you might want a taco with your ride, is teaming with Taco Bell for Taco Mode
Have you ever asked your Lyft driver to make a quick stop at the drive-thru on the way to your destination?
Well, now there’s Taco Mode for that.
The in-app option, the result of a parternship between Lyft and Taco Bell , will be available from 9 p.m. to 2 a.m. and take riders through the restaurant drive-thru on the way to their destination. Just passing through a Taco Bell location comes with a free Doritos Locos Taco.
“I kind of think of this like inverse delivery — like we’re delivering you to Taco Bell,” Marisa Thalberg, Taco Bell’s chief marketing officer told The New York Times. “You’re being delivered to the food as opposed to having to get in your own car and drive.”
A pilot for Taco Mode option begins this Thursday in Orange County, California near Newport Beach and runs through July 30. It starts again Thursday, Aug. 3 and continues through Aug. 6.
According to Lyft’s announcement, Taco Mode will expand into additional markets by the end of the year and roll out nationwide in 2018.
Lyft’s Tacoma service area reaches the southern border of Pierce County, but has yet to expand past Orting to the east.
Puyallup, Bonney Lake and most of Fife fall under Seattle’s service area.
As of now, neither Lyft nor Uber have stated policies regarding how drivers should address fast-food drive-through stops.
Fast-food stops have been widely discussed on message boards among drivers, and Lyft’s decision stoked the flames some.
The smell, the mess and the time spent in drive-thru lines are the main complaints.
“All ‘just a quick stop’ request(s) are money losers,” one driver wrote on reddit. “I'm getting paid $2.39 for this short ride, now I have to spend 15 min in a TacoBell drive through to make my car smell like fast food. With no extra pay from Lyft. No thanks.”
Riders, on the other hand, are thrilled.
“This is an actual dream come true ...” Megan McMahon wrote on Twitter.
Until Taco Mode comes to Tacoma, it’s only an 1,100 mile Lyft ride from here to Newport Beach.
This story was originally published July 25, 2017 at 1:07 PM with the headline "Lyft thinks you might want a taco with your ride, is teaming with Taco Bell for Taco Mode."