Slashdot Mirror
Internet Grocery Shopping Slowly Gaining Ground
bakreule writes "Online grocery shopping, once the laughing stock of the internet, has quietly started gaining ground. It seemed that the idea had been killed shortly after the bust as being just another bomb. The article has some good interviews and details to show how this industry is developing and whether or not this surprising growth can continue. I'm interested in seeing how grocery product advertising will be affected in this highly competitive industry."
I've seen far too many of those "grocery gateway" trucks driving around. The way this is going geeks will never need to leave the house.
Dear aunt, let's set so double the killer delete select all
I always wondered how these places stay in business. Do you really think the vendor's actually put a lot of thought into finding the perfect tomatoes, freshest eggs and milk, and softest loaves of bread?
;-)
Or do they sell whatever the oldest crap they can get away with selling?
Personally, unless I'm buying books or CD's, I'll stick to real-life visits to the local grocery store.
I track known Slashdot scumbags on my foes list!
Some people, when looking for a new apartment here in NYC will ask: "does FreshDirect deliver here".
Here's what I do: Bitty Browser & Andromeda
I live outside of a major city but too far to get this right now but even when I lived in the city my biggest problem with the idea was stuff like produce. I love cooking and I am very picky about my fruit and veggies and cuts of meat. According to the article, however, this seems to also be a big concern of the companies. They even claim that they would do a better job. I would have to see that.
I actually enjoy grocery shopping sometimes (ok call me a freak) but I would to pull up a recipe and have the ingredients delivered.
When I was young and rich (no kids), I used a phone version of this, and it's really cool. Costs a fair bit more, but its damn convenient.
I imagine they could get pretty competetive pricing now.
You can't expect to wield supreme executive power, just because some watery tart threw a sword at you
While this trend may catch on in ultra-urban settings like NYC (where even McDonalds delivers), I can't see it making its way to mainstream America.
For one thing, who wants to pay for delivery? Second, my biggest gripe with grocery shopping was the crowds, which is why I love 24 hour grocery stores... I simply go at midnight.
"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
I always thought those were a scam!! :)
We use a mixture of on-line and local stores, mind you, our on-line shopping is all from major UK chains. Not having a car, it's much nicer than battling on the bus with shopping to have assorted munchies delivered to your door.
You don't need a lab to make mud.
It shouldn't be anytime before they are able to deliver or hire 3rd party delivery drivers and have them delivered right to your door, all in the same day.
Hmmm.
Otherwise, you are relying on someone else to select meat and produce for you.
A love beyond compare...
I, and I'de estimate 90% of the people on my street, already rely on Tesco's and Sainsbury's online grocery ordering. IMO the greatest benefit is not having to put up with screaming kids whose parent's post school shopping coincides with my post work free time.
Damn, wrong article. Ignore the above :P
It's better to burn out than to fade away
I loved the searchable selection, the ability to pre-build shopping lists, and coolest of all was the one-click recipe ingredient ordering. I especially miss not waiting in line during the 5:30p grocery rush.
I live in a smaller town now (100,000) so I'm not holding my breath until I can get access to this again, but I'd be quite willing to pay 10% more to have this service.
The meek shall inherit the earth, in 3 by 6 plots. - Lazerus Long
The Tesco chain of supermarkets over the English side of the pond are having great success with Internet grocery shopping. They have a good percentage of the country covered by the service (but not where I live :-\)
http://www.tesco.co.uk/
I think most people who are surprised that these companies can stay in business and who don't see the appeal of the service are overlooking those people (a lot of students) who don't have cars. I used Grocery Gateway often as a student because it meant I could buy more food than I would be able to stuff in my backpack to carry home.
But here, in the UK, its actually doing pretty well. Hell, I get all my heavy goods (beer, cans, pet food) from the web. Save the shopping list, once every 2 months, just wack a button, enter credit card details, pay the 5 delivery (less than the fuel/parking costs) and it turns up the following evening.
As to the submitter's question about online grocery marketing, I don't think it will change too much. I for one go to the aisle of what I want to buy and look for the little yellow sale tags... then buy that one. I don't think website shopping and flashy ads will change that so much and at 10$ per delivery, I don't think you're going to have a lot of hunt and peck shoppers getting their 69 cent soup from one grocer and their 3$ microwave pizzas from another.
Not to mention at 10$ per delivery people like me who spend maybe $40 a trip on the high end will be willing to spend another 25% for delivery. That's where competition needs to happen. Drive those delivery costs below $5 and I can eliminate my single social burden!
LilMikey.com... I'll stop doing it when you sto
Here in the UK, the Tesco and Waitrose supermarket chains have been taking orders over the net and delivering the goods by truck for several years. It's no longer remarked upon as being anything special.
Tesco were the first to realise that using their regular staff picking goods off the shelves of their regular supermarkets was a low-investment and very cost-effective way of linking orders to delivery trucks.
Paul
Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate
And what really, really annoys me, is the 'selective alternatives'. They haven't got a pack of 4 chicken wings, so they give me 2 turkeys. Hey, it's got four wings... okay, I'm exaggerating slightly, but when you can't miss noodling round the store with a trolley buying what you want.... it might be okay for the convenience, but you can't beat real shopping.
internet connection - check
ups - check
food/drink - now checked
bathroom plumbing that doesn't smell next to the computer - not checked yet
getting closer to the "don't need to getup point"
I think you mean "In America, Internet Grocery Shopping.." because certainly here in the U.K, it's pretty big business. My wife and I have been using Tescos once a week for two and a half years with no problems. Tesco and several other large stores who provide online-ordering and delivery are also turning a tidy profit in addition to their regular brick & mortar stores.
Syllable : It's an Operating System
Instead of a shopper's card, these stores use something called an IP address, which is being broadcast TO THE WORLD as we speak! I feel this is the beginning of the end of our democracy. You won't even be able to buy tinfoil for a hat without being tracked.
We use Simon Delivers fairly regularly, and for us it's a nice way to cut down on grocery shopping trips . It's a bit more expensive than the big grocery chains, but if there's one thing I hate, it's sloshing through the "big box" grocery stores. :-)
Throw in an occasional trip to Sams Club (non-free reg required) to stock up on bulk staples, or a trip to the local farmers market and co-op and the hateful trips to the "big grocery" chains are all but eliminated
So the economy keeps going in the direction of personal services, it seems.
This is sure to save time...fill out grocery list at work, submit it, the voila! Groceries arrive within a few hours of being home. And it might even limit impulse buying.
To-do List: Receive telemarketing call during a tornado warning. Check.
Schwans delivers frozen foods. I've been using them ever since GroceryWorks went under and have been very pleased with their product quality.
One thing I really like is my food arrives frozen. The nearest grocery store to where I live is 10-15 minutes away and frozen foods tend to defrost a bit by the time I get home due to the hot Texas sun. Melted/refrozen ice cream from the grocery store isn't very good.
Although the CNN article focuses on the US experience, the UK has had successful and profitable online grocery shopping for several years. UK chain Tesco was one of the first - with an in-house developed software system - and now most of the UK major chains have followed suit with similar systems.
The Tesco system was initially thought to be un-economic as it simply comprised staff going round existing stores and loading carts that where then delivered using small vans to homes in the locality - but apparently its been profitable since the outset.
Tesco's approach is compared to that of WebVan (who feature in the CNN article) in this document written by a Prof at Wharton (free - but registration required)
More recently, a WebVan style UK Grocery operation called Occado has started too - working with upmarket Grocer Waitrose. Their approach is to use central warehouses to fill orders and distribute.
All this competition has resulted in competition between providers both on price (several offer the service 'free' for spends over a threshold of about 75) and quality (for example, discounts if delivery times are missed, or the goods / brands you order are not in stock etc.)
I don't know about mainstream America, but here in rural upstate NY, food delivery certainly has caught on. It seems like every other house gets delivery from Schwan's. The reason for this I think is that there are no grocery stores within 15 miles. It can be damn convenient to have that Schwan's truck stop by every other week.
Now, the problem I have with this service is that the food (not counting the very high priced steaks, etc.) is, to my mind, almost totally snack food. Some of it very good snack food (ummm... Tacquitos) but snack food just the same. A steady diet of this stuff and you're probably not going to be doing yourself any good.
Also, of course, only a couple of (frozen, of course) vegetable and fruit items.
the food is far more fresh than anything you would find in a grocery store. it goes right from teh warehouse to your door without the middle man. i guess it depends on the service. fresh direct in manhattan is actually one of the best websites i have used ever.
The smaller home delivery vendors have always been in this space and have expanded in the online venue. Our local dairy delivers milks, eggs, bread and now all other food products from frozen food to fresh meat and cheese has a website to order your weekly delivery. Schwann's is another company that sell frozen only but have expanded order placing to the Internet.
So these larger markets are really just cathcing up to the smaller family established businesses.
I can describe the two local supermarkets in my major city within "quick" walking distance as
- Outrageously expensive (Hint: suburban readers, double or triple what you usually pay)
- Terrible quality
What do I mean by "terrible?" How about dirty, nasty, not stocking certain common items for days or weeks, bugs, whatever. And I'm talking about major chains, not bodegas here!They simply relied on there being no competition. And now all of a sudden there is. People would flee to delivery services even if they weren't easier, better and cheaper. Not to mention that carrying groceries is a pain in "carless" environments, especially for older folks, especially if you live on the 3rd floor without an elevator.
I see the grocery delivery trucks everywhere now, and every day. Judging by the frequency, I'd say the local supermarkets where I am have already lost a significant amount of business. Bravo capitalism.
Want to Know How to Cheat the GPL? Read On!
From the article:
The key struggle for grocers is to make their service convenient enough and the cost low enough -- most charge less than $10 for delivery -- to change decades of shopping habits. Online grocers also need to operate in cities with high population densities and heavy Internet use.
Delivery costs are probably what most limits this kind of service.
If delivery costs could be reduced, say by taking the human (driving a two ton gas guzzler 10 miles each way) out of the loop, then this service would really take off.
The technology is almost here for cost-effective robotic delivery vehicles. With liquid fuel costs increasing dramatically, automated delivery will be here even sooner.
There should be less and less reason to send someone in car on a Go Fetch Errand to pickup groceries, a new hard disk, etc.
"Provided by the management for your protection."
I used to use shoplink.com back in 2000 or so. I loved it - the food was great, came on time, and I saved money, both on the groceries themselves, and on a distinct lack of 'impulse shopping'. Unfortuneately, they went under a few years ago, and I now live in an area that noone services.
I've seen people in this thread saying to 'keep it to canned goods' etc. Let me tell you - the meats I got were great, along with fresh veggies and fruits, etc. It was a great service.
"The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground." - Thomas Jefferson
I live on a 5th floor walk up in Warsaw, Poland, without any really good shopping places in my immediate vicinity. So every couple of weeks, I'd take the bus to a large supermarket, buy stuff for 2-3 weeks and take a cab home. Now, I save both time and money just by putting orders through a local grocery store.
For fresh produce, meat and fish, I still go to the local market. But for name branded goods with freshness seals, it's online shopping all the way. Last weekend I ordered just beverages - 60l of juices, water and pop. That's about 70kg of weight (counting bottles + packaging), so I was more than happy to not have to carry it up.
There are some things I will never buy online - fruit, veggies, meat (they don't sell them anyway) - but for the other stuff, it's a great solution.
http://www.e-zgrocer.com/
This service has been around for a few years. We're in a very sparsely populated area (35k people in my town). When it first started, we mocked it, saying that it would never work around here. Then we realized that it was still around, and aparently gets good use.
I think their secret is that it wasn't some kind of VC startup, but rather a grocer that decided to go online.
...do they take coupons?
The PC Weenies: 11 Years of Online Tech 'Too
I think what the US stores are really waiting for is those RFID tags. Then you will be able to walk into a store and just walk out with what you need. They already understaff the checkout lines to encourage people to use those annoying self checkouts.
Once we get the RFID tags, hopefully our cupboards and fridges will become smart and maybe my fridge will become autonomous.
As long as my kitchen magically fills with beer and ding-dongs, I'll be happy !!!!
-- "It's not stalking if you're married!" My Wife.
Laughing stock? I've been using Grocery Gateway (www.grocerygateway.com) for many years now in Toronto, Canada, and they are great. They deliver good food and have _awesome_ customer service if you ever have any issues (I had two incidences where they mixed up items in my order). The delivery guys are pleasant, and don't act as though they are rushing to the next delivery. I'm moving out to the west coast of Canada in a couple years, and I hope that this company expands beyond this city by that time so I can keep using them.
I'm not affiliated with them, just a happy customer.
http://bike.stu.ph/rides - free GPS routes available for Garmin, Magellan, GPX and Google Earth
I use FreshDirect in New York and it rocks. The produce is generally better than if I picked it out at the store. Things are fresher, and I can get a better selection of brands. Oh, and including delivery charge, ($3) it ranges 8 - 10% less than the ghetto-style grocery store at my corner! No lines, no cramped aisles, no moody checkout clerks, no overcharging...
The delivery times are really good and it is next-day service. I will never go back to regular shopping again. This is like when I got my Tivo; completely revolutionizes everyday tasks.
Wouldn't it be cool if you could go to the online grocery web page and
* type in your own recipe, or
* pick from an easy-to-use list of recipies
* how many people will be involved w/each meal
...and it gives you not only the list of ingredients and how much of each you will need, but also a map in the store to optimize your time?
You could do this from home, or from a computer kiosk at the grocery store itself. I always forget an ingredient, or spend too much time wandering around the store looking for a hard-to-find item.
Now THIS would be a useful application of technology to a very low-tech thing. (Remember, spray on usability is bad)
Most lowtech/hightech fusions that have gone down in publicly hilarious fireballs are due to the gross MISapplication of technology. Simply using a web page to pick out individual ingredients (separate from what the meal of which they are just a component) is just taking the existing paradigm and putting it on a web page. Won't work.
I've been using Grocery Gateway for 2.5 years now since I moved to the Greater Toronto Area, and it has made a huge difference in the amount of available time we have as a family. My wife is expecting our first child any day now, and to know that she won't be faced with the extra hassles of shopping for groceries with a newborn really makes me feel good. I love the quality of the products, and the prices are reasonable. We don't have to tip the driver, they are always on time. Special note to the geeks is that it is truly a great e-commerce site, and the user interface is excellent. I can find anything there, including booze! I am such a fanboy...
Here in the UK, the Tesco and Waitrose supermarket chains have been taking orders over the net and delivering the goods by truck for several years. It's no longer remarked upon as being anything special.
Its nothing new on this side of the pond either. We used a pre-Web/pre-internet online grocery delivery service back in around 1992 (the online component was a BBS dial-up connection which let you enter your order via a TTY terminal app).
Tesco were the first to realise that using their regular staff picking goods off the shelves of their regular supermarkets was a low-investment and very cost-effective way of linking orders to delivery trucks.
Thats how the circa 1992 service did it too.
This is the part that does never made sense to me. Although shop-from-shelf does not require the billions in investments that WebVan made in customized pick-n-pack distribution centers, the labor costs are much higher. Unless Tesco charges higher item prices, I don't see how they are making money on the venture. Most online grocery services charge what seems like a token delviery fee that cannot possibly pay for the labor of the shopper or the driver, let alone pay for the truck, advertising, customer support, etc.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
I am in the Washington DC metro area and was a regular user of Peapod (moved recently, now very close to a grocery store). The quality of produce and meat was comparable to what was in the stores. Only problem I ever had with a product was a jar of expired mayo, they gave me a credit to my account. With one or two exceptions (out of 20 or so deliveries) the driver was on time, and even then was only 15 minutes late and someone called to inform me.
When WebVan was around, they were *extremely* popular. So popular, that everyone would wave at the delivery guy as he drove by. I myself was an extremely happy customer as it saved me from having to carry a lot of groceries home. (I didn't have a car at the time.)
I think that WebVan's problem had less to do with a poor business model, and everything to do with scaling the business way too fast. They burned through a tremendous amount of cash every time they entered a new market. As a result, they were left with very little operating funds. They always figured that they'd be able to get more funding. Unfortunately, you can always count on VC investors to go to extremes. They over funded during the boom, and they simply wouldn't fund at all during the bust.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
You specify a delivery slot (depending on the company this can be in one- or three-hour increments) place your order and wait.
They're delivered from the local store in small vans with refrigeration units. If something is out of stock they'll deliver a replacement item. Anything you don't want (ordered too much milk? pears overripe?) you can send back with the driver and the amount is deducted from your bill.
Tends to work very well.
--
This sig is inoffensive.
My experience with Internet Grocery Shopping was less than successful. I tried using an local grocery store that offered an Internet online shopping service.
On the plus side, their site was well designed and easy to use. The prices were good. You could even choose to pick up the groceries yourself to avoid paying the delivery charge.
One the negative side:
(1) The service was unreliable. Many times, as I unpacked my order, I discovered missing products. They were charged on the bill, but nowhere in my delivery. The hassle involved in correcting this problem ("We'll deliver it to you, are you going to be home for the next little while? No... ummmmm") was not worth it.
(2) The selection was not complete. Often, especially with fresh herbs, the store would be "out of stock". This would force me to go elsewhere to make my order complete.
(3) They staff had a "couldn't care less" attitude. More than once I arrived to pick up my order to find it sitting by the front window in the full sun, with the meat browning and the herbs shrivilling nicely.
In the end, my wife and I found that it took just as much time to do the shopping ourselves as it did to do it online. So why bother?
Life is like a web application. Sometime you need cookies just to get by.
Does this mean that we'll start calling bigger, older computers grocery getters?
---
Lousy rotten karmic retribution.
I've been using Peapod in DC since 1999 and I can't imagine ever going back to a supermarket.
My conversion was simple: my wife and I lived in an apartment and a typical shopping trip was capped off by parking in the basement garage and lugging countless bags (esp. those filled with cans) up a flight of steps, waiting for an elevator, walking to our door fumbling for keys, and then heading all the way back down for one or two more trips.
When we moved into our house, I figured the need for Peapod might diminish, but if anything we use it even more. We still an organic foods market for fresh vegetables, but for staples -- especially ordering cans in bulk for the pantry -- nothing beats paying just a little more for someone to deliver it to your door.
Now if only someone could resurrect Kozmo! Ordering fresh bagels and milk on Saturday morning and having it delivered 30 minutes later -- and returning your DVDs rented the night before in kind -- amazing...
I forget the name of the first company we used, but I recall they were a bit sloppy with their choice of items, and not very polite when they delivered them.
We tried GroceryWorks and were amazed. The produce and bread they selected for us was top notch. When they arrived they were very polite, applied OR-type booties to their shoes as they entered, and delivered the bags right to our counter. It was a pleasant experience. Unfortunately, GW disappeared.
We later tried the store's version of home delivery and were greatly disappointed. The list of groceries you could buy was limited. The selections and delivery were less than pleasing.
If it becomes available again, we'll try it, but we'll use our experience to our advantage, and that's what advice I'd offer to anyone considering this service: 1) Shop around. Hopefully you have more than one choice of service provider. 2) If you are choosy, limit what you order. Canned and boxed items are completely safe as long as you get the brand you want. Produce, bread or any other item that requires personal attention should be picked out by you. 3) Look for good customer service. If you have to call someone placing the order or for problems, make sure they're customer-oriented. When they deliver, watch for politeness and consideration.
In summary, for ordering all those bulk items like canned goods, crackers, chips, cereal, etc. and so forth, these services are perfect. For produce, breads, refrigerated or frozen items, or anything else that requires selective choice or careful handling, you should still visit the store. What this really provides is reducing the amount of time you spend in the store.
(We're a family of five, including three kids age 5. 5. and 4.)
I can't imagine going back to traditional grocery shopping. I've seen the light - and I'd gladly pay an additional 10% to keep buying my groceries online.
The cure for cancer is coming: Reovirus
My g/f is visually impaired and has many friends that are visually impaired and blind. Because they cannot drive it is often hard for them to get all the groceries they need. Services like this are really helping that segment of the population. They all love it and think it's one of the greatest things ever. It is truely amazing how much you learn (as a fully sighted person) when you interact with people that do not have the luxuary of full sight. Services like these are just another thing that makes their lives much eaiser. I hope they stay around for that fact alone.
K Man
One of the big outfits for online groceries in Canada is Grocery Gateway. At my last job I worked with them for a couple of weeks (mostly looking at some of their IT systems - they run a tight ship and have good IT people if that matters) and got a good understanding of their business from the inside.
Essentially, they started out as, and still are, a shipping company. They don't just ship groceries, but pretty much anything that you would normally think to pack into a truck and ferry off somewhere. They partnered up with some grocery supply companies and basically inserted themselves as a delivery company and website. They don't really charge much for delivery, but they don't have to to stay profitable. Bulk buy directly from the wholesalers and distributers, mark up items so they're competitive with the grocery stores and charge a nominal fee for delivery and bang, you've made money.
As for the quality of the foods, they partner up with Sobey's for much of it, and the produce is about the same quality as what you'd get off the shelf in a good Sobey's. (For non Canadians, or people who don't live near a Sobey's - Sobey's is a grocery store that can definitely boast well above average quality produce.) I'm not a shill for these guys, and I don't work with them any more, but I can say that the quality isn't bad at all.
One of the other things I've done is try out Green Earth Organics and Fresh Piks. (No link because their site is down. Fun fact: When it couldn't find the server, M$'s built in auto search suggested www.Fleshpics.com as an alternative. Not the best suggestion when looking for an organic fruit and veggie delivery company. Probably a fun site though.) Both provided better produce than anything I ever bought in a grocery store, it was delivered and since I didn't want to waste anything I ate more fruits and veggies, and cooked more than I ever did at any other point in my life. If I weren't living in Spain now (where restaurants prominently feature recognizable animal parts where they cut the meat from and many don't serve salads at all) I'd still be getting a weekly delivery from these guys.
Someone has to pick stuff out and ship it to the store, why the hell not have someone pick it out and ship it directly to me. They know that if they drop the ball on quality I'll take my business elsewhere so they do better than the grocery store does. Anyway... I think that this is something that was a long time coming...
I tried out some of these services when there was little or no delivery charge, but I still couldn't make it make sense.
The problem was the 4-5 hour delivery window. The main attraction of such a service is for busy people to save time. I realized pretty quickly that I could just get off my ass and go get my grocieries in that time--no waiting around.
Now I'm sure many people have easily schedulable chores/work at home etc., but as a young guy I don't have 4 hours when I want to chain myself to my house each week.
So close and yet so far from the world's perfect ID number
It's really tough for many elderly people to go grocery shopping - some are too old to drive a car safely, many grocery stores don't have powered carts so you have to walk the store, and the bags are heavy. Unfortunately, there are no online grocers where my parents live (both are in their mid 80s, and have the above problems). I was worried that the concept was going to die when Peapod and (I think it was called) Homerun ran into problems. But it sounds like it's catching on.
-MDL
Happy meals fund terrorism
When our little one was born in 2000, we found that NetGrocer had a much better selection of packaging options for the baby formula we had selected than our local grocery stores. We bought quite a bit from them.
---- Politics: Kissing ass and pointing blames.
The biggest complaint I'm reading is "who wants to pay for delivery?" Well, me, for one. The charge is $7, but otherwise the food isn't much more expensive (some more, some less).
Is it worth it? You bet. I hate grocery stores -- they are usually jam-packed with rude assholes, and even a modest shopping list will take an hour from your day. I'd happily pay $7 to avoid that frustration-filled hour of my life.
"The market alone cannot provide sufficient constraints on corporation's penchant to cause harm." -- Joel Bakan
I've been using grocery gateway for a while now. It's quite nice! You can even get delivery in the evenings.
Being in Toronto with no car means that it saves a bit of money. The $5 delivery charge is potentially much less than a taxi fare.
When our little one was born in 2000, we found that NetGrocer had a much better selection of packaging options and types for the baby formula we'd selected than our local grocery stores. We bought quite a bit of it from them.
---- Politics: Kissing ass and pointing blames.
Anyway, the demographics this market will best sell to are:
-The Libra
"Please be patient--The future will begin momentarily."
The justification I always give for using FreshDirect is that I can go online and buy 5 boxes of Twinkies without the accusing glares I would get in the grocery store when I dump a shelf-full into my shopping cart.
Labour cost must be saved elsewhere because item prices are the same.
If you have your exact list and know the store really well, it probably doesn't take a lot longer to pick the goods off shelves than to sit at a checkout and check them all through. Delivery usually is charged for.
Overall, they make a sizable profit on the operation, and have done for some time, see eg. here.
The NTUC (gov't ran trade coop) Fairprice borg of small low selection stores has an online site for non-parishables. The thing was a .net partnership with the government so it isn't a surprise that the shopping cart and browsing system has yet to keep track of multiple page categories nor does the search work very well. Some items they have, you literally can't purchase because of this. Shipping is OK, but it is through our post service which while great as a postal carrier, lacks some customer service for this. No stock control if you can actually find what you want.
Coldstorage (one of the semiindependent 'chains' in S'pore) has great selection of products online, a great search and category system. However, it never has a correct stock count and some items they never stock.
Prices overall for these delivery services are comparable with the regular stores, though because of stock issues you may end up with only half of what you order. It has more than once been a problem that we must go buy missing items at actual the store, hence making home delivery quite pointless and actually time consuming.
First off, they fall asleep on the way there. Marvellous. So now you have to wake them up before you can get out of the car - that really cheers them up, as you can imagine.
Next up, the trolley has to be perfection. Yesterday's favourite is today's screaming fit, so you must make sure Her Majesty will deign to actually sit in the bloody thing (the son currently gets no say...). You can force the issue, but your ears will suffer.
You then get the fun of said two year old reaching out to every shelf and grabbing what she wants. If you put it back, she grabs it again or screams. Meanwhile my son is just screaming anyway - no apparent reason, unless it's the same one I feel like screaming about as well.
Finally, we get people such as yourself. We know we're pissing you off. We just don't get a choice about it. Some people respond graciously, others stare as if you're utter scum.
Nope, it's online shopping from the parents' point of view too as far as I'm concerned. Chuck 'em a fiver, and let the delivery people handle it all. It's a good deal for both me and you, it would seem.
Cheers,
Ian
I've been getting (almost) all of my groceries delivered for about a year. I know this sounds like a sales pitch, but :
1) I've cut my gocery bill (no impulse buying)
2) I've lost weight (same reason)
3) I've stopped listening to "Feelin' Groovy" and "Up, Up in the Air" almost completely.
That last one is worth the $5 delivery charge just by itself!
The grocery stores seem willing to give subsantial discounts if you a willing to use your "membership card", but the problem with that is that you don't have to use it every time, or give accurate information for the account. If the grocery stores provide delivery, they have to know your true address and therefore would get superior customer tracking data.
It may be that the benefit of collecting superiour data on your customers helps offset the cost of providing delivery. This would be especially true if the customer is willing to pay a premium for the service.
About two years ago, when it was Homegrocer.com, I used them at least ten times, buying enough food to feed a family of three healthy eaters for two weeks at a stretch.
The produce and meat cuts were better, consistently that what I could find myself in any of the four local stores close to my Kirkland Washington apartment.
My wife loves to cook, but had some health issues at the time so she couldn't stand or walk for more than a two to three minute stretch. According to her... I truly suck at finding a good tomato, or fresh bell pepper. I still don't know why the hell she thumps cantalopes.
These people impressed her, and she raved about the quality all the time.
Later, when they went out of business, we started looking at other home deliveries. Albertsons.com did not deliver quite the same quality at first, but got better later... We never tried cosmo, or webvan.
Now, my wife is far healthier, and we can grocery shop again... however I think I'll try some online grocers a few more times, and see what kind of quality I get now.
I mean, it'd be an awfully big vending machine, but if they automated the process and had certain items pushed onto a conveyer belt, automatically packed up into a bag, and put into a refrigerated delivery truck, this could be fast and efficient, plus you can probably sell the stuff at near wholesale prices rather than relying on frantic shoppers pulling stuff off shelves at a mile a minute.
Also, this would be a good way to hire more of the packaging engineers in this country, to figure out how to transport eggs and potato chips in this system.
The problem was never whether there was a viable business model in the idea of delivering groceries to homes. The problem was that it's a low-margin business, and it doesn't lend itself to the massive "economy of scale" theory behind most of the dot-com era companies.
Think about it for a second. Chances are that there's more than one grocery store in your town. Here, in my town of about 40,000 people, we have two Stop & Shop stores (both on the borders), a Shaw's, a Market Basket, both Wal-Mart and Target (selling a decent amount of groceries), and a smaller local store run by a guy who has four stores in the area. Plus a number of smaller specialty and convenience markets, and a couple more supermarkets right outside town - including a Trader Joe's.
My point is that all these stores have enormoous fixed costs. It's expensive to run a grocery store - for personnel you have deli staff, bakers, cashiers, baggers, management, stockers, butchers, etc. Depending on the store size, that's 10-30 people per shift. You also have high real estate costs, because your store needs to be in a nice, desirable shopping area, high advertising costs (though manufacturer co-op dollars help), and perishable merchandise that has to be disposed of if it doesn't sell. Not to mention high electrical costs, lots of water consumed, and high trash costs.
Now, take the same or better merchandise, stock it in a warehouse that's much cheaper to maintain, and pay delivery drivers instead of cashiers and baggers. You save on some of the fixed costs but make up some of that on the electronic infrastructure.
Altogether, it's a potentially viable business model that can work at least as well as the brick & mortar version. The catch is that the giant brick & mortar chains didn't spring fully formed from a venture capital infusion. They grew over time to become the giants - generally with one or two stores that did well enough to fuel expansion over a generation. Try and build big from the start, and you've got big costs. You don't have time to wait for the customers to find you. Start small, service a few markets well, and you won't run out of cash before the shoppers come. That kind of growth isn't good enough for either the VC market or Wall Street.
But it's good enough to build a company if done right.
-- Josh Turiel
"2. Do not eat iPod Shuffle."
I've been using peapod , which is stop and shop's online service. I can say nothing but good things about them. The biggest benefit is that we save alot of money and time. My wife and I used to go on sunday afternoon to the grocery store, and just basically impulse buy what we thought would be enough food for the week. We'd end up with far to many cookies and ice creams and not enough healthy food. Peapod has helped us alot with this since we can just log in anytime we think of something we need or have run out of, and then save the cart until next time. We typically start making the order right after we recieve previous order, and will add items for the next couple of weeks (I find it easier to order 2 weeks of groceries at a time). Delivery fee is only about 5 dollars if you order over $100 worth of groceries. They also remember all your previous orders so you can look back and see what you ordered last month or last year, and you can copy/paste a text list into their search program to speed up searching for items. It's really a great program, and I reccomend you try it at least once if it is available in your area. And now for the shameless plug, if you do sign up as a new customer based on my positive thoughts: my account is peapod at heem.org of course substituting the word at with the @ symbol.
Don't Tread on Me
What I'm waiting for is for every item I buy at the grocery store to be RFIDed, and for my fridge and pantry to read all of these. My computer would keep a list of my desired inventory of staples and upcoming menu and any special order items and I would get a weekly delivery from the grocery store willing to provide refills at the least cost.
My wife and I use Peapod and we love it. The produce is always nice, the meat and fish is fresh, the drivers are courteous, and their customer service is pretty damn good. The downsides are that you can't always find specific brands you want (especially with non-food items like hair care stuff) which may require that you drive to the store to get that stuff, and if they are out of something they will sometimes substitute it with a similar item. For example, I used to a eat large, red delicious apples for lunch every day. If they were out of those, sometimes they would substitute small, red delicious, or some kind of green apples. The quality was good, but the small ones are puny (they didn't bring any more), and I don't care for the green ones.
Other than that, we have been happy using them, and have found that it saves us money and there are health benefits. We don't buy the impulse, junk food items that we would if we walked into the grocery store and saw them sitting on the shelf.
ive been using spud for a while know these guys are awesome!
spud urban delivery
back in the day we didnt have no old school
"It seemed that the idea had been killed shortly after the bust as being just another bomb."
This no different to the zillion other dot.bomb ideas that were venture funded and died in a flash. The companies that have actually succeeded (I live in the UK and we use online grocery shopping all the time) are the existing bricks and mortar supermarkets that built online shopping onto the side, and even those have only become profitable recently.
For instance, Tesco (doing well, but still only making 100million turnover - not profit - in its online activity) works by using human instore "pickers" who wheel around large crates and pick out items from a LCD touchpad: scanning each item as it is stored in the crate. The crates then slide into a truck for delivery slot.
This fantastic approach eliminates a large amount of overhead in setting up specific warehouses and infrastructure, and builds upon existing distribution chains and logistics, it copes with occasional "missing items" (by way of substitutions - for which you can provide annotations or expressly deny). Meaning that you get actual standard in-store low prices.
Tesco integrates online and instore experience: when you shop instore with your points/reward card, any purchases then appear in your online favourites list: quite easy.
Tesco is also the UK industry leader on quality, price and innovations: all other supermarkets tend to snide at Tesco when they do something, then sometime later decide to join in and compete when it turns out that Tesco had the clues up front.
Equally, they've taken the online shopping very smartly: low risk approach, building onto their existing business, and gradually integrating both the back end and front end (customer) experience between the two words.
While I doubt many/.'ers keep kosher, for people who do, it's very difficult to shop online. Here's why:
Basically, the way you can tell if something is certified kosher is to examine the packaging for a "hecsher" - it's that little circle with a U inside, or the Star of David with a K in it, or any similar looking thing (obviously, different markings are from different kosher-cert orgs, so you've got to be careful to know which ones to trust).
However, it can be VERY difficult to ascertain what's kosher certified or not from online photos of the good. A lot of the time, the packaging shown online won't have the hecsher, or it'll be too small to see what it is, that sort of thing. Online shopping is therefore a bitch for the kosher consumer, and will continue to be until someone figures out how to exploit this problem for some commercial gain.
Seeing as kosher Jews (forgive me for stereotyping) tend to be pretty good eaters (ie, would order quite a bit), you'd think there would be _some way_ to make some money off this. Hmm.
But, anyways, there's one kind of person that an online supermarket just doesn't help too much these days.
-Erwos
Plausible conjecture should not be misrepresented as proof positive.
First of all, I enjoyed the description of "once the laughing stock of the internet". That's an interesting way to put it. Obviously a bit of a stretch, but not too far from the truth. It's just always been a weird market (pun noted). The local grocery stores can only get so much business online and the central guys (like NetGrocer has always tried to be) can't stock heavy stuff (due to shipping costs) or perishables.
I've been kind of watching developments in this sector recently, mainly because I'm interested in the data that could be made available on grocery chains' websites. You could build your shopping list on what the store actually carries, exact sizes and brands and everything. Then print it out and go buy. Better yet, pay for your order online and have pullers at the store go pull your groceries and have a cart waiting for you when you get to the store. That right there would be tremendously convenient, even without delivery.
It's also useful to have the inventory data online, just to see how much things cost. Comparison between stores and making sure you know how much you'll be spending before you get there.
I wish the grocery sector an exciting next five years or so online while they find their online identity.
RP
We used Pea-pod for a while and I have to say it never occured to me to tip the driver. I was paying $5 for delivery - so was a tip expected? Do most people tip?
I used to use Publixdirect but they closed down a couple months ago. You did all your shopping via the web page, paid online with a credit card, picked your delivery slot to within a 1.5 hour window(and they'd email you in the morning with a more accurate estimate) and the delivery charge was something like 8 bucks.
I never had issues with stuff missing from orders, every time I ordered fruit or eggs everything was fresh and in great condition. My only complaint was that they didn't always have exactly what you might want. Like they'd have vanilla or chocolate pudding mix but not butterscotch. But it was a minor annoyance as I'd just go without the few things they didn't carry or change brands.
I really miss it and hope my area(SE Florida) gets another internet grocery shopping service soon.
my girlfriend's parents live in CT and they get Schwans deliveries. We often get boxes of individually wrapped chicken breasts from them which are very convenient.
Blar.
Perhaps not, but you can do the reverse. Make a customized web-coupon to use at a local store.
Schwan's got it right in the U.S. They've been doing home grocery/food/meal delivery for years. When Internet popularity rolled around, they took advantage of technology to improve their business rather than to create it.
A local organic delivery company, SPUD, still seems to be going strong.
Their website is nice, their prices are good compared to the local grocery stores, they have products we can't find elsewhere, and it's pretty convenient.
What I don't like is their default-delivery model. If I forget to sign in and configure my groceries two days before the delivery date, we get the default order. We like apples and carrots, but we can't eat as many as they put in the order.
Agreed. Not available in my area, unfortunately. Now if we could only bring back telecommuting.
I just started using Peapod. My personal experience is limited, but my sister-in-law has been using it for a year and is very happy.
With a 3 year old, a 4 month old and a full time job, I've reached the point where I'm simply out of large blocks of free time. I had started going shopping at 7am on Saturday, not because I like it, but because that was the only time I could go. Now I submit and order to Peapod and groceries arrive the next day.
Quality of produce and fish (my main concern) are excellent.
My only problem is that I buy my meat, milk and diapers at a warehouse club, and I do my own cooking (no higher-priced pre-packaged meals) so it's hard for me to hit the $100 cutoff for the lowest delivery charge ($4.95). But I got coupons for $5 off my first 5 orders, that plus choosing discounted delivery times should give me almost 2 months of nearly free service. They don't have everything available either, but if you have to go to the B&M store, you're in and out in 5 minutes.
I'm liking the lists feature, too. You can break things down by category (I've got lists for pantry items, baking, produce, etc), or by recipe (list everything you need and buy what you don't have - great for menu planning).
For me, what it boiled down to was this: Am I willing to pay someone $5-$8 to go shopping for me and deliver the groceries to my kitchen? Answer: Yes!
DD
"Can I finish? Can I finish?
I look and I look and I look, but I can't find this service anywhere that supports me (southeast Michigan). I *want* this service, and yes, I'm willing to *pay* for this service.
o Yes, I'll still leave the house, but instead of spending a Saturday based on grocery shopping, we can go canoeing or hiking or if the weather's crummy go to the cinema.
o Yes, it's worth the $10 or see fee, unless your time is worth considerably less than that $10 you save by doing it yourself. See previous point.
o Fresh Produce -- this is the cheap way to cook, and it's healthful and delicious to boot. So, yeah, there may be a problem with fresh ingredients, which would destroy all of our meals. But if they want to work out and make money, market forces will prevent them from giving us crappy produce. If you don't have time to cook with fresh produce, maybe avoiding a trip to the grocery store can let you try it!
So if anyone has any leads on some groceries in the Macomb county area that work online, lemme know.
--Jim (me)
When my mother began to be seriously afflicted by Multiple Sclerosis, she tried to find ways that she could help around the house, and this was one of them. A local taxi service would even deliver the groceries for $5. However, she used to marvel that they could actually make money that way, and I am in that camp as well - the store has to pay someone to find the groceries on your list, bag them, take them to the car, like paying someone to be you at the store at no additional cost to you. On top of already low profit margins, I fear this is just going to flop again.
~Ben
My local grocery store Giant Eagle tried this out a year and a half ago. They offered a free trial for something like 3 or 6 months, where there was no delivery fee. I used it weekly and it was great!! Then they discontinued the service because I guess not enough people were willing to pay the $9.95 delivery fee. I was shopping weekly at the time so I wasn't going to spend $40/month on delivery. I suggested they should start offering a $4.95 service where they would shop for you and you could pick up the bags at the store, but that never happened.
:(
Now it's gone, and now I shop every 2 weeks buying a lot more stuff each time, so it might be worth the money now, but I'm out of luck.
Lowes Foods has a service called Lowes Foods to Go. You order online, they do the shopping, and you go pick it up (you don't have to leave the car; they bring it out to you). You can save your shopping lists so reordering is simple.
They charge a $4.99 per order flat fee, but even with the fee, our grocery bill has gone down a bit (probably due to lack of impulse buys).
It's a nice service for my pregnant wife, but I suspect she won't stop using it even after the twins are born.
I've used Acme's online ordering and delivery twice so far. Both times there were errors in what they delivered versus what I ordered. The driver/delivery guy did not want to spend the time for me to make sure that I checked the order (he was nice enough, but he acted like he was in a big hurry), and both times I had to call the toll-free customer service number to get a refund or redelivery with the right stuff. To their credit, they made it right both times. Until drivers take the time to ensure that what they deliver is what was ordered, and they have the authority to fix the problem on the spot, there will still be some bad word of mouth press.
Peace
Quite obvious actually. There's another plus that most people are forgetting about (especially since it's summer for most). Not having to go out in bad weather. Not having to deal with traffic as much (Telecommuting will fix that). The only thing I'm worried about is the rising price of gas.
Seriously, about halfway down the article, they mention someone named David Berkowitz....
...delivering 110,000 orders per week. They are also the largest supermarket in the UK and Ireland (2nd largest in Europe) - it's thus interesting that they are doing online shopping (and profitably) while the likes of Walmart are not.
Tesco also do online shopping in Ireland as do Superquinn. Both vans are a common sight on the street so I would presume they are popular.
How fucking lazy are people going to get? I mean give me a break!
I've used Tesco for 3 years, almost every week.
Excellent service on the whole.
It does rather depend on the store where they pick and dispatch your goods, but I've had very few problems with mine (Cirencester).
Fresh produce is usually well chosen. Substituted items are normally logical ones (with the odd suprise - but that gets you to try new things!).
Give it another shot!
We used to have a choice of both Webvan and Peapod back in the day. Both were great. Right after our daugher was born, by C-section, my wife was ordered not to carry loads and to avoid stairs where possible.... we had a flight of stairs to the front door to our townhouse at the time. She was a heavy user of Peapod for groceries and DrugStore.com for diapers. She once said: "How did people ever have babies before the web?"
Anyway... Peapod was great, they did a wonderful job of selecting produce for you... always first rate stuff. But they pulled out of the area because they were competing with Webvan and were not interested in bleeding money in exchange for market share.
Webvan continued for a while, but let's face it... they were clucks. They had *no* control over their costs. Very stupid. In the grocery business the margins are thin and you *must* be on top of your costs. Webvan were completely brain-dead idiots in this regard, they did lots of things in expensive ways for no benefit at all over the cheaper ways. They deserved to die.
We have used Safeway.com a few times... but don't use them for anything other than food-in-a-box. Their produce is marginal to begin with, and what they select for web orders is the dregs of the bin. Both Webvan and Peapod delivered *great* produce... Safeway.com is a health hazard on wheels in that regard.
Back in the dotcom days of internet supermarket, I was a big customer. I usually did not order produce and kosher meats but everything else I ordered. I felt that having groceries delivered to you was a step into the "future" (with flying cars and moving sidewalks). When all the online grocery stores went belly up, I felt the collective "one step forward, two steps back".
I have waited a long time for online grocery stores to make a comeback. Now, if Peapod could just hurry their ass up and expand to Dallas/Fort Worth, all will be right in this world.
ChozSun
ChozSun.com
Ya know how HomeGrocer.com ran out of buisness? Everything else it going to go down the drain like HomeGrocer.com did.
I use Groceries to you and the service is great. I pay about 10% more for my food and a $35 monthly fee for weekly deiveries. For my $600/month grocery bill, I'm shelling out ~$100 for this service. My wife and I save at least 2 hours a week each, as we shop together, not a bad trade-off. The extra money we're paying for this service is well worth having a few extra hours a week to goof-off with the kids, instead of grocery shopping.
I don't see this as an internet business, but as a business that uses the internet to make communcation easier. I couldn't imagine running this type of company with hand written or e-mailed lists from customers.
As for the quality, the meats, fruits and veggies are as good as what I pick for myself. For things like bananas, you can request green, yellow or brownish and they'll get what you want.
It's because they were there long before anyone else, and they've got most of the teething problems dealt with. Having tried Sainsbury's online service recently, they have a long way to go to catch up.
I have tried on-line ordering at Safeway and Albertsons in the San Francisco area. Both of them claim to be out of stock on part of the order. When the delivery date is 2-3 days out, I would think that they could back-order from a warehouse.
The merits of Tesco online have been well discussed in this thread. It was a bit ropy when launched, but is now slick enough that it only takes 10 minutes to put an order in, and lots of people use it regularly. Instead of driving 20 minutes each way and handling each item six times (item off shelf into trolley; item out of trolley onto belt; item off belt into bag into trolley; items out of trolley into car; items out of car into house; items into cupboard) I handle them twice (bags from doorstep into house; items into cupboard).
The supermarkets now have to offer this service to defend their market share. The profit from Internet shopping isn't from the fiver they charge for picking and delivery, it's from the profit margin on 100 quids worth of groceries. Their option is either to offer a delivery service or to lose the sale to someone who does.
With RFID tags on everything the process will become even easier. Your fridge and cupboards will have a continuous inventory of what you have, and so your regular order can be filled in automatically as stocks of things are depleted. OK, so your fridge won't know that your mates are going to come round and drink all your beer, but it can order some more for you. And for the things which get depleted at a more even rate (coffee, loo roll) you would find it just turned up in your weekly order when it was running low.
So while online ordering -> grocery delivery is great, it should be seen as a first step in a much more far reaching process.
Dunstan
The last scintilla of doubt just rode out of town
"I wasn't beating my kid (that's bad, and should never be done!!!!)."
"They thought we were slapping wrists, or spanking the kid (which did happen, as physical pain from a handslap is sometimes required)."
????
You are aware that imparting physical pain to your child is, in fact, beating? No one should be hitting a child that young for any reason. At all.
Sorry, I have two young kids myself and my older 3.5-year-old son is quite active, curious, intelligent, and emotional. His 'grabbing' and related annoyances have begun disappearing because he became more mature from 2 to 3, not because we gave him any physical "encouragement". He is a joy to take on trips to the store or just about anywhere else in public now. We have normal conversation about things that rarely involve any publicly "unacceptable" behavior.
Although there were times I questioned our resolve not to use physical punishment, I would not want any part of his personality, achievement, and social adeptness now to have been quenched with his minor annoyance to the rest of society as a 2-year-old--a developing human being who barely has a grasp of communication much less their own emotions or what is socially acceptable. I see kids who are brought up 'proper' to not annoy me in a public venue. Many are passive, uninterested, and frankly boring a few years later.
As for the 'looks', did you have your kids to show off how good of a parent you could be? Screw 'em. I got more looks of understanding than of annoyance. You just remember the latter more. Our society (US, at least) is growing more and more anonymous and the expectations of what you should and shouldn't have to deal with in public are sadly distorted. Blame the sickos, blame the DINKs, blame the atheists, blame your government, blame your TV. Whatever the reason, we need to get a little more compassion and community back in everyday life.
But above all, don't hit your kids. Not for fear they will hit you or someone else--they probably will anyway at some point. Not because of some fear of "scarring" or other silly deeply psychological reason. But rather because it teaches them nothing about promoting and developing self-control and instead makes them respond to some pavlovian external stimulus that involves pain.
Rather than having the food delivered to a residence, why not have other people pick the items in the store for you? Imagine your local grocery store offering a service where they'd do the shopping for you (based upon an order placed online) and have it waiting for you at the door. Just pay and leave, as if you were picking up dry-cleaning. By removing the driver/refridgerated truck/gasoline the savings should allow this to be a cheaper / free service.
Just a thought.
Not quite true. King Soopers, a Denver-area chain owned by Kroger, has a service called "HomeShop." It is available in our area, but I've never tried it.
Be who you are...and be it in style!
You'd say, well that's not as good as doing it online where it's more intelligent; but the fact is that in urban india, internet penetration is poor, but phones are everywhere.. Just an intteresting example of how a model made a course correction...
I never liked trying to look through the ads and follow the sales. Driving to several stores to get everything for the lowest price was a waste of time and gas (and made it easy to forget items). Being able to plan out meals and have the needed groceries delivered is wonderful. Gives me more time for my computers, games consoles, reading, or going out to a movie.
I was taking one day at a time, but then several days got together and ambushed me. (from a Rhymes with Orange comic)
hm, I don't recall it ever really being that outrageous for people to order groceries from the web...
Mod me down (no, really, this part's offtopic) but that comment smells sorta like the NYT story about the burgeoning US sex slave trade, that was then debunked on Slate. Smell meaning, squeezed out of the thinnest of evidence.
Of course, like Rumsfeld on Face the Nation, I'll be glad to backpedal if someone wants to Thomas Friedman me...
Intelligent Design: because MATH is HARD.
You need Net Grocer. Click the "Kosher" tab. They deliver nationwide but are limited to non-perishables.
You damn liberals are raising a new generation of glorified pussies. If it were not for African Americans, Southern White Americans, Hispanic immigrants other groups not infested by liberalism, today the United States would have no military.
Why do you not kiss Mr. Taliban?
I guess you fit the slashdot profile. You would have to be quite unattractive to chase after blind women.
"It was my understanding that there would be no math during the debates."
Too bad these people don't hire guys like me..
I've already a better solution, but everyone knows MBA's and Sales/Marketing people don't have a clue.. I guess we should just let pass money back and forth cluelessly. At least it will keep them happy..
Just say no to license servers!!