Why People Are Paying Up to $50 for Delivery From In-N-Out
In-N-Out has exactly one policy on delivery: no. No DoorDash, no Uber Eats, no third-party apps, no exceptions. CEO Lynsi Snyder-Ellingson has been consistent about this for years, explaining that delivery compromises the quality and freshness the chain has built its reputation on. The company sued DoorDash in 2015 over unauthorized food delivery and trademark use. The position has not wavered.
But demand has a way of creating its own solutions. Across Southern California, a shadow delivery economy has emerged — freelance “burger brokers” advertising unauthorized In-N-Out runs on Facebook Marketplace and other platforms, braving the notoriously long drive-through lines and delivering the food directly to customers for fees ranging from $10 to $50 on top of the food cost.
Some of those customers never received their food.
How the Burger Black Market Works
The operation was first uncovered by the independent publication L.A. Material, which found nearly a dozen rogue couriers on Facebook Marketplace advertising unofficial In-N-Out delivery across Hollywood, Orange County, and as far as Santa Barbara. Their listings range from professional-looking posts with real burger photos to bizarre AI-generated images — but all offer the same basic service: you send them your order and payment, they go to In-N-Out, they bring it back.
Payments are typically handled through Zelle or Cash App before the food is delivered. Which is exactly where the risk lives.
L.A. Material tested the service directly. They paid $50 to a broker, sent their order, and waited. The food never came. Follow-up attempts to contact the broker went unanswered. With no official platform, no recourse, and payment already sent to an anonymous stranger, there’s no mechanism to get the money back.
It’s not the only platform this is happening on. Airtasker — a gig-work marketplace where users post jobs and name a budget — now has a dedicated In-N-Out delivery page, with recent listings showing people willing to pay anywhere from $10 to $100 for someone to make the drive-through run. The difference is that Airtasker provides at least some platform accountability that Facebook Marketplace doesn’t.
Why People Are Paying This Much for a Burger
The demand reflects something real. In-N-Out operates in California, Nevada, Arizona, Utah, Texas, Colorado, and Oregon — and even within those states, the lines at many locations are legendary. For someone who doesn’t live near one, or who doesn’t want to spend an hour in a drive-through, paying extra for someone else to handle it has obvious appeal.
Some listings reveal the genuinely creative uses people have found. A recent California post offered $50 for someone to pick up an order and deliver it to a nearby restaurant for a wedding after-party. One person reportedly paid $200 and crossed an international border to get In-N-Out into Canada. Someone else described sending the components separately so a recipient could assemble the burger themselves and avoid the sogginess problem.
The CEO’s Position
Snyder-Ellingson addressed the delivery question directly at a Pepperdine University event earlier this year, saying the company would not offer delivery services that could jeopardize the quality of their food. It’s a position the chain has held since long before delivery apps existed.
In-N-Out’s 2015 DoorDash lawsuit spelled out the concern explicitly: the company has no control over how long delivery takes, what temperature the food is kept at during transport, or the food handling practices of third-party drivers. A burger that’s been sitting in a car for 30 minutes in Los Angeles traffic is not the same burger that comes through the drive-through window.
Whether In-N-Out will take action against Facebook Marketplace brokers the way it went after DoorDash is an open question. The scale is much smaller and the couriers are individuals rather than a funded startup — but the brand protection principle is the same.
In the meantime, if someone on Facebook Marketplace offers to deliver your In-N-Out order and asks for payment via Zelle up front, caveat emptor.
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