Uber Eats goes back to 2013 to make convenience guilt-free

Uber Eats has run out of things to prove about range, so it has moved on to something harder: making people feel fine about ordering.

The company's Australian business launched "Phew," a new brand platform from long-standing creative partner Special, retiring the four-year-old "Get Almost, Almost Anything" platform that ran in more than 17 international markets. Where the old work broadened perceptions beyond takeout into groceries and retail, the new one drops the utility argument altogether and sells relief.

The change follows ethnographic research that surfaced a stubborn tension: even heavy users still feel a flicker of guilt about paying extra for convenience, however stretched their week is. "'Phew' shifts focus from utility to the emotional value of on-demand convenience," Special executive creative director Simon Gibson said, describing a pivot from functional awareness to emotional connection. "'Phew' seeks to alleviate this tension and continue to normalise on-demand delivery as a solution to daily pressures."

The launch film, directed by Steve Ayson, makes the case by way of a period piece. It is 2013 — B.U.E., before Uber Eats — and protagonists Sam and Ollie are attempting dinner. A radio bulletin sets the tone: "Quick news update: Kimye are engaged, straws are plastic and Lance Armstrong is a hero to us all." A man at the supermarket entrance brandishes Blu-ray discs as the height of technology. At the register, a gloriously unhurried cashier played by Troye Sivan scans while a queue backs up behind him. Outside, LMFAO's Redfoo fronts a flash mob, because that also used to happen.

Sam and Ollie make it home, cook, and then Ollie tips the entire meal onto the carpet and wonders aloud whether anyone could ever get things delivered at the press of a button. Cut to 2026.

"Transporting people back to 2013 was a fun way to remind everyone just how friction-heavy life was before on-demand delivery became second nature," Gibson said.

The nostalgia is doing strategic work rather than decorating. Guilt about convenience depends on forgetting the alternative; a comedy about queues, flash mobs, and Blu-ray evangelists restores the comparison without ever scolding the viewer. It also lets a delivery brand talk about time without the grim productivity language the category usually reaches for.

The platform marks the latest chapter in a nine-year partnership between Uber Eats and Special, which began with "Tonight, I'll Be Eating…" and has since exported two platforms globally. Given that record, "Phew" is unlikely to stay an Australian story for long.