The Futuristic Way You Could Soon Be Getting Chick-Fil-A Delivered

In 2017, The Guardian wrote a disbelieving article about DoorDash's delivery robots after a journalist got stuck with one on a sidewalk and complained that it was a bit like "getting stuck behind someone playing Pokémon Go on his smartphone." The same year, a The Verge journalist got his Chinese food delivered for the first time by a robot and scared his girlfriend inside the house when he couldn't stop taking photos of the novel event.

Since then, delivery robots have tried their hardest to take over the food delivery industry. On college campuses, students are getting used to delivery robot invasions, a phenomenon that at least one Reddit user has described as "a South Park episode." Helping out robots who get stuck when trying to navigate turns has become, says Twitter, a thing. (Some robots have even learned to say thank you when assisted.) When they get run over by a car, of course, there's nothing much to be done for it, or for the meal it was diligently trying to provide (via Twitter).

Now, Chick-fil-A wants in on the action. Restaurant Business recently announced that the fast-food chain has partnered with Kiwibot to start test-delivering fried chicken sandwiches to select locations.

If you live in Santa Monica, California (like, say, Christian Bale or the Beckhams) and you're a fan of fried chicken and reminders that robots may one day, actually, rule the world, Chick-fil-A has good news for you. As per Restaurant Business, three Santa Monica California Chick-fil-A locations will soon be using Kiwibots newest, semi-autonomous four-wheeled rovers to deliver food. "What we promise is to at least halve the time it takes for all orders a mile or closer, and more than half the cost," Kiwibot COO Diego Varela Prada said in a statement. Average wait time? 30 minutes. Cost of delivery? $1.99. Personability? Apparently, Kiwibots newest models can wink, which isn't the same as hearing "my pleasure," but ... close enough? 

Business Insider says that Chick-fil-A's Kiwibots will have upgraded capacities to navigate around people and vehicles and to detect traffic lights. They still need the help of a real, live person to cross the street, though. There's no reason to think that the experiment will fail. As Fox 13 reports, Kiwibots have delivered food over 150,000 times in the past.