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Google Launches Fresh-Grocery Deliveries

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Re: Google Launches Fresh-Grocery Deliveries

#61

Post by kevingadd »

ehudla wrote: post #57

SV: Supporting the Asperger life style since 1998.

Grocery delivery is extremely important for people with disabilities, people without cars, and people who are otherwise not able to burn an hour or two going to buy groceries. It's not just something for rich programmers.

When I order groceries from Safeway the extra fee on top is pretty small and their employee brings it up on a cart and carries it all inside. This means that it's much easier to buy a bunch of groceries in bulk, which means less trips to the grocery store and less orders, helping make the fee amortize out a bit more.

Safeway's service actually offers more fresh stuff than I can find if I visit a local store. The Safeway closest to me is space-constrained (downtown San Jose) so in practice they only stock around half of the things I can get via the delivery service.

Re: Google Launches Fresh-Grocery Deliveries

#62

Post by lucaspiller »

Symbiote wrote: post #58
nikolay wrote: post #52

I'm pretty happy with the free and near real-time Amazon Now. Amazon Fresh is one of the rare Amazon failures. Well, it's still around, but at $299/year (well, minus $99 for Prime) plus tips for delivery - it's expensive! I got the Express trial and was happy that I'll be able to save trips to Costco, but, no, I won't as they possibly offer less than 1% of Costco's inventory, so, it's a totally useless service for me…

The UK has a very competitive market for grocery delivery. It's existed using the Internet since 1997 - it's one of the first services I remember people being attracted to. Everything is available, and after almost 20 years they've obviously worked out how to deliver what people want (fresh / unripe / whatever). Delivery is still £1-5 or so, depending on time, and the supermarkets often have a minimum spend (or addit…

Tesco will deliver for under £40 (previously £25), but will charge £4 extra on top of the delivery fee.

Although there are a lot of players, apparently they operate these services at a loss [0].

[0] http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2707071/Supermarket-...

Re: Google Launches Fresh-Grocery Deliveries

#63

Post by JetSpiegel »

makerman1982 wrote: post #43
joelrunyon wrote: post #4

What's Google's USP here? This service sounds like everything Google that Google goes at great lengths to avoid (physical products, customer service, etc).

I think what many comments are missing is how self driving cars play into this. Imagine a car goes to the store, pings a helper for the items, drops off the items. Wages are way lower and you have mostly capital cost.

Drops off the items how? A catapult?

Re: Google Launches Fresh-Grocery Deliveries

#66

Post by yoz-y »

dannyr wrote: post #9
sogen wrote: post #2

This is cool until they sunset it like countless others.

So what if they sunset this service? The worst thing that could happen is you go back to going physically to the store to buy groceries. It's not like you won't have the ability to buy groceries if the service stops. I personally like that companies like Google are trying out different things.

This should not be a Google product, they have Google Ventures to support somebody else to do it. Google has a trillion of rotting product they keep pushing out and then killing.

Problem with any of these Google side projects is that they come in with a huge cash reserve so they are not playing on a level field with other companies that would like to do something similar. Then, when they leave, it leaves us with a barren ecosystem and takes time for other players to come in. My favourite example is Google Reader which practically killed RSS services for years.

Re: Google Launches Fresh-Grocery Deliveries

#67

Post by jon-wood »

mmgutz wrote: post #15

I'm skeptical this will be successful. I just can't see these kind of operations selecting ripe and fresh produce like my mother taught me from the grocery store. They're concerned about their bottom line and will send whatever is available. Good for the stores, not good for wise consumers.

At Hubbub we've never seen that happen. We're working with independent shops who know they're part of a marketplace where they're competing against other grocers, and if they try to palm off their rotting stock on a customer we'll refund it at their expense, and the customer likely won't buy from them again.

Re: Google Launches Fresh-Grocery Deliveries

#68

Post by ascorbic »

nikolay wrote: post #52

I'm pretty happy with the free and near real-time Amazon Now. Amazon Fresh is one of the rare Amazon failures. Well, it's still around, but at $299/year (well, minus $99 for Prime) plus tips for delivery - it's expensive! I got the Express trial and was happy that I'll be able to save trips to Costco, but, no, I won't as they possibly offer less than 1% of Costco's inventory, so, it's a totally useless service for me…

The rumour a few weeks ago that Amazon was about to buy Ocado was pretty interesting. While almost every supermarket chain in the UK offers delivery, Ocado is the only one that is online-only without physical stores. They have a big infrastructure with warehouses around the country, but most importantly they have excellent software, which they white label for other companies. As well as jumping into the UK grocery delivery market (which is the most mature in the world), they'd also get their hands on the technology to take it to other countries.

Re: Google Launches Fresh-Grocery Deliveries

#69

Post by michaelt »

roel_v wrote: post #50
Outdoorsman wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are not selling groceries... They are selling the convenience of having groceries delivered to your home... The two are entirely different, the margins, as well...

Grocery delivery here in the Netherlands is booming, with the big supermarkets offering their own and several smaller players working on services. When I buy from the biggest supermarket here, delivery fee depends on the moment of the day you want it delivered (between 5 and 8 in the evening is the most expensive, e7 (~$10)); cheapest moment is e3 or so. But, if you buy some products delivery is free; this week it wa…

  if you buy some products delivery is free; this week it
  was 8 bottles of coke or so
I'd be interested to learn more about that - could you provide some links?

Re: Google Launches Fresh-Grocery Deliveries

#70

Post by roel_v »

michaelt wrote: post #69
roel_v wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Grocery delivery here in the Netherlands is booming, with the big supermarkets offering their own and several smaller players working on services. When I buy from the biggest supermarket here, delivery fee depends on the moment of the day you want it delivered (between 5 and 8 in the evening is the most expensive, e7 (~$10)); cheapest moment is e3 or so. But, if you buy some products delivery is free; this week it wa…

if you buy some products delivery is free; this week it was 8 bottles of coke or so I'd be interested to learn more about that - could you provide some links?

Only in Dutch, but here is the page: http://www.ah.nl/gratis-bezorgen/wk7/coca-cola?ah_campaign=i... .

At the top it says 'free delivery when buying 2 4-packs of coca cola, for deliveries on Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday. Also valid at pickup points.'

The 'pickup points' are where you can go to collect groceries yourself; you order online, it's bagged for you, you drive into a location where they put the bags into your car, you pay and you drive off. Takes less than 5 mins, many people schedule it on their way home when there is nobody at home to accept deliveries.

I love the home delivery thing - it feels very decadent though.

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