I spent a day being pampered by robots. I still had to tip

Silicon Valley technologists have long foretold a future of dexterous robots that could help with housework or provide companionship. But while startups promising pizza or on-site security provided by robots attracted plenty of funding, the results for consumers have often been underwhelming. Like a Roomba caught on a shaggy rug, the android revolution sometimes seems to be stuck in neutral. 

But that may finally be changing. Want proof? Well, after years of hearing about robotaxis, you can go outside and hail one, with a quality of experience that’s often better than you’d get with a human driver. 

What will be the next consumer service to get Waymo-ized? We compiled a list of local robotics firms to see if they could win out against human-powered experiences or are worth the money. Then I accepted my editor’s challenge to try them all in a single day.

Would spending a day with robots provide a peek into the future or highlight just how far these machines still have to go? 

My first priority on a recent sunny Thursday morning was getting my caffeine fix, so I swung by Botbar in downtown Oakland. A white robot greets you from behind the bar the moment you walk into the small cafe, looking somewhat like if EVE from “Wall-E” were glued to a table and programmed to pour espressos all day.  

You order drinks from a touchscreen that offers standard fare alongside specials like a coconut latte. Once you place your order, the robot whooshes to life and methodically combines components like ice, milk and espresso shots. A human supervisor is on hand to answer questions and keep the machines clean and safe, but during my visit, the robot did all the work.

The drinks are no cheaper than elsewhere ($5.65 for an iced latte) and there was no discernible difference from a human-made beverage.

Actually, the Botbar barista kind of broke my heart. It handled our drinks with elegant flourishes! It spewed facts about the coffee beans! It danced, for goodness sake! This robot begged for attention, but no one else ordered coffee during my roughly 30 minutes inside. Botbar has another location in New York’s Times Square, which makes way more sense than Oakland’s quiet downtown for something this gimmicky.

When the ordering system hilariously (gallingly?) asked if I wanted to leave a tip, I opted to do so. Frankly, I felt sorry for this wannabe star performing on its desolate stage. (Later, I reached out to the company to ask about the tip and who or what it actually goes to. There was no response by press time.)

Charged up with espresso, I hopped on BART to make my way to the next experience: a robot “minicure” (unlike a regular manicure, it doesn’t include shaping, just polish) in downtown San Francisco. 

Since Clockwork began testing its nail-painting robot in 2021 in the Marina, it has rolled out 22 machines across the country, including two in SF. I’d made my appointment inside one of downtown’s POPOS, an airy lobby that advertises the service outside. 

The experience costs $10 and takes as little as 10 minutes. The machine guides you through the process of selecting your polish and positioning each finger within its reach. No robotic hand massage, though. 

Unlike a manicurist’s smooth swipes, the robot traces your nail from the outside in, depositing color as it goes. You have to apply the optional clear top coat yourself.

While Clockwork won’t replace a visit to a traditional nail salon, it provides a convenient way to quickly freshen up your fingers on the go, which is why it’s had success in airports, as a perk in new residential buildings and even in Walmart Supercenters. 

“We want to meet our customers where they’re already spending their time,” said CEO Renuka Apte, adding that the company’s machines are “bringing the precision of surgical robots into the consumer space.”

You may not get luxury or fun nail art, but Clockwork has you covered for speed and price.

Feeling spiffy, I headed for my next stop: lunch down in Foster City, where I had organized a taste test with a robot-powered food delivery service called Olhso, which cooks and prepares customers’ food en route.

Every morning, the company’s two Korean barbecue trucks are loaded up with pre-made, uncooked meals. When a customer places an order, a robotic system plucks a container of ingredients from the truck’s fridge and sends it to an automated wok, which essentially puts it through a culinary spin cycle. Once everything’s cooked, it gets poured into a bowl on a little conveyor belt, which carries it to a window where, upon arriving at the right destination, a human driver picks it up, adds the final garnishes and delivers it to the customer.

In this case, Olhso’s truck concocted the food in a public park instead of on the road, so I could watch its robotic system in action. Meals with meat cost between $45 and $55, with each order serving two to three people, while the vegetarian japchae glass noodles ring in at $25 for one to two people. The food looked and tasted delicious.

Although the service doesn’t have any immediate plans to expand to San Francisco (the narrow streets and parking would be a nightmare for the massive trucks it currently uses, according to COO Charles Kim), it would solve my main gripe with food delivery services: that your meal arrives cooled down, with added fees as a hefty side dish. (Ohlso doesn’t charge service or delivery fees, though it provides an option to tip the truck’s driver.)

To get to my next stop — the office of Chef Robotics on Market Street — I called my robot chariot, aka a Waymo. The pick-up point in the Brannan Street REI parking lot seemed to confuse the poor vehicle: It circled the parking lot twice before finding a place to pull over. Once I made it inside the car, it ferried me smoothly to the destination, with nary a sideshow impeding the voyage. 

Of all my robot escapades, the Chef Robotics field trip was the least interactive, because its product is not focused on consumers. The company builds robotic systems that work alongside humans in food preparation assembly lines for Sunbasket, Amy’s, Chef Bombay and other companies.

Watching the machines build sample lunches, I felt like I was in my school cafeteria. But instead of hair-netted lunch ladies, it was robot arms depositing lumps of mashed potatoes and piles of corn onto plates. The company helps clients increase volume and provide more consistent portions (because no, a robot isn’t going to accidentally put extra broccoli in the pad thai).

Each type of food handled by Chef Robotics machines requires different utensils affixed to the robot arms, such as scoops, claws or, most entertainingly, a suction nozzle, which pulls chicken breasts up from their tray before plopping them on top of a dish.

Though I didn’t eat any of the mechanically prepared lunches on that visit, I’ve consumed a troubling number of frozen meals in my day, so chances are high that I’ve eaten the fruits of Chef Robotics’ labors in the past.

As I waved goodbye to the Chef Robotics team, I felt worn out. The robots may be inexhaustible, but I am not. Luckily, my fifth and final destination promised a bit more pampering, as I headed to Berkeley to have a Luum robot glam me up with false eyelashes. 

The human lash artist helped me pick a style and shape and walked me through what would happen once the robot took over. The first step is literally getting your eyes taped shut; as a newbie, I found that part slightly disconcerting.

At first, the robot struggled to place my falsies. But once the technician adjusted my position in the machine, it started gluing on lashes in earnest. 

I couldn’t see what the robot looked like while giving me a makeover, but the process felt like almost nothing. Watching the video recap, though, the experience appeared like some kind of alien surgery. 

Afterward, the technician leaned over and started applying the more delicate lashes at the corners of my eyes. Luum touts as one of its benefits for consumers that it provides an alternative to someone breathing on your face for an hour, but having human hands on my eyelids — rather than plastic, mantis-like implements — felt reassuringly familiar. 

I can’t say whether my completed lashes looked better than if a human had handled them alone, but I definitely felt more fabulous (and can see why aestheticians would appreciate the teamwork). 

Luum’s service costs $170 for a full set of lashes — before a tip for the human — which is on the cheaper end of the spectrum. A “refill”— when you go back before all the old lashes have fallen off — costs $80. Luum said it gets a lot of repeat customers. 

By the time I left the company’s sleek studio, fluttering my newly acquired lashes, it was 6 p.m., and I was feeling worn out by all my android appointments. Nevertheless, I was satisfied that unlike the robots of yore — poorly made pizza machines, a flopped home assistant, ridiculed security guards — the bots I patronized during my whirlwind day seemed to work well. 

On video chats that night, when I recapped my  fairly ridiculous day, my loved ones reacted with giggles and surprise, their disbelief highlighting how delightfully futuristic my experience had been. Nothing like the human touch, right?