After staying out late one night, Joshua Zeiring was in dire need of some Advil. The only problem was that he didn’t want to go out in the rain to get it. He mumbled to himself:
“We should have drones to deliver this $#*!”
And that’s how QuiQui was born.
All your pharmacy items, delivered by drones. 24 hours a day.
QuiQui (pronounced “Quickie”) is a drone delivery service that will begin delivering pharmacy items throughout San Francisco’s Mission District this summer. It will operate its drones 24 hours a day and guarantees your order will arrive in 15 minutes or less for only $1.00. Everything from toothbrushes to breath mints will be available to order from a push of a button on your cell phone.
QuiQui chose to focus their efforts on the Mission District because of its lack of tall buildings and relatively flat landscape. This makes it much easier for QuiQui to operate its fleet of drones below the required 500 feet AGL (altitude above ground level) required by law. There are no plans to expand the service to other cities but if QuiQui is a success in San Francisco, other metropolitan areas could follow suit.
The launch of QuiQui comes weeks after a federal judge with the National Transportation Safety Board ruled flying commercial drones is legal despite the FAA insisting that it’s not. Because of this ruling, businesses are currently using drones to deliver all sorts of items including tacos, beer and pizza. With QuiQui now delivering pharmacy items, one could only imagine what’s coming next.
QuiQui will eventually offer prescription deliveries as well and are currently negotiating with pharmacies to figure out a way for people to get their prescriptions refilled in a secure manner. Certain drugs like painkillers won’t be immediately available because QuiQui doesn’t want controlled substances in the hands of people who should not have them. But this will change once QuiQui figures out a way to deliver the drugs without risk.
People that need prescription pain medicine would benefit the most from a drone delivery service like QuiQui and I must admit, it’s pretty convenient. When you’re in unbearable pain and need relief, it would be very nice to have a drone drop off your medicine at your doorstep, don’t you think?
It seems like the drone age is currently stuck in the Wild West and anything goes. And until the FAA figures out a way to regulate them, we may just have to get used to having unmanned aircraft flying over our heads.
