Show HN: Get notified when grocery pickup slots are available

#1

Post by thecodemonkey » Thu, Apr 16, 2020, 6:20 PM UTC

Show HN: Get notified when grocery pickup slots are available
curb.run

Re: Show HN: Get notified when grocery pickup slots are available

#2

Post by thecodemonkey » Thu, Apr 16, 2020, 6:24 PM UTC

Hi HN!

We realized that curbside pickups is a great compromise for everybody's health and safety right now.

We built Curb Run because we found it very difficult to get a curbside pickup slot at our local Wegmans. Willing to drive a bit further away to another location, I hacked together a little script that would check for pickup slots across multiple stores in a radius.

Fast forward, friends and family started hearing about this and asked if we could help them too. We ended up turning this into a web app for everybody to use -- and with many more stores and chains across the US.

We hope that this can help you as well!

Re: Show HN: Get notified when grocery pickup slots are available

#3

Post by gullyfur » Thu, Apr 16, 2020, 6:58 PM UTC

Hey, this is cool! I tried to setup a curbside pickup for my elderly parents with a local store through instacart, but after getting to the end I discovered it was for next week. Couple thoughts:

1. Could I just provide a zipcode instead of sharing my browser location?

2. Could I check stores in aggregate? I'd rather discover which local business has the MOST openings and then register an account there, rather than getting to the end of the shopping experience and waiting.

Lastly, you have a typo "seend" in your third step.

Re: Show HN: Get notified when grocery pickup slots are available

#4

Post by htunnicliff » Thu, Apr 16, 2020, 7:00 PM UTC

Such a great idea!

Do you have any plans on open-sourcing this?

Re: Show HN: Get notified when grocery pickup slots are available

#5

Post by seltzered_ » Thu, Apr 16, 2020, 7:06 PM UTC

Have you stopped to think about the ethical implications of this?

Could you put a warning to be mindful and only consider the service if you're high-risk or in a situation where curbside is the only safe option?

I love the fact that my high-risk parents are using curbside pickup, but I find myself better fitted to wear a mask and do the groceries myself during off-peak hours. The last thing I think the world wants is (presumably younger) people in tech taking up curbside slots before other people in the community.

Re: Show HN: Get notified when grocery pickup slots are available

#6

Post by c0nducktr » Thu, Apr 16, 2020, 7:09 PM UTC

This is really great! I've sent it to a couple of my friends who are immunocompromised and have been having trouble getting slots. Thank you for making this!

Re: Show HN: Get notified when grocery pickup slots are available

#7

Post by thecodemonkey » Thu, Apr 16, 2020, 7:15 PM UTC

seltzered_ wrote: post #5

Have you stopped to think about the ethical implications of this? Could you put a warning to be mindful and only consider the service if you're high-risk or in a situation where curbside is the only safe option? I love the fact that my high-risk parents are using curbside pickup, but I find myself better fitted to wear a mask and do the groceries myself during off-peak hours. The last thing I think the world wants is…

Hi there! Absolutely. This is why we are explicitly focusing on curbside pickup rather than delivery. It is not about snatching slots as soon as they become available, but more about being able to check across dozens of stores at the same time. We've found that there are actually plenty of pickup timeslots available -- if you just look a bit outside super-urban areas. Call it human-loadbalancing-as-a-service if you will.

Re: Show HN: Get notified when grocery pickup slots are available

#8

Post by dubcanada » Thu, Apr 16, 2020, 7:16 PM UTC

seltzered_ wrote: post #5

Have you stopped to think about the ethical implications of this? Could you put a warning to be mindful and only consider the service if you're high-risk or in a situation where curbside is the only safe option? I love the fact that my high-risk parents are using curbside pickup, but I find myself better fitted to wear a mask and do the groceries myself during off-peak hours. The last thing I think the world wants is…

I don't get your question.

Curb-side pickup is better as having a ton of people inside small grocery stores considering all of them are not meant to handle large amounts of people attempting to keep a set distance from each-other.

If curb-side pickup becomes more popular they would increase available slots by allocating more resources. What is happening right now is you have one or two managing curb-side and a ton inside managing everyone else.

What should happen is grocery stores should be closed except for employees and your groceries should be delivered to you, or you pick them up curb side.

It would eliminate a whole realm of issues with people not following rules, coughing on produce, not washing hands, moeny exchange, long lines, etc.

And if you implemented a strict health check on employees it would be way easier for everyone.

Re: Show HN: Get notified when grocery pickup slots are available

#9

Post by throwaway1777 » Thu, Apr 16, 2020, 7:19 PM UTC

seltzered_ wrote: post #5

Have you stopped to think about the ethical implications of this? Could you put a warning to be mindful and only consider the service if you're high-risk or in a situation where curbside is the only safe option? I love the fact that my high-risk parents are using curbside pickup, but I find myself better fitted to wear a mask and do the groceries myself during off-peak hours. The last thing I think the world wants is…

It’s a game of cat and mouse with tools like this, just like with restaurant reservations, shoe drops, ticket scalping, and anything else that’s scarce.

Re: Show HN: Get notified when grocery pickup slots are available

#10

Post by thecodemonkey » Thu, Apr 16, 2020, 7:20 PM UTC

gullyfur wrote: post #3

Hey, this is cool! I tried to setup a curbside pickup for my elderly parents with a local store through instacart, but after getting to the end I discovered it was for next week. Couple thoughts: 1. Could I just provide a zipcode instead of sharing my browser location? 2. Could I check stores in aggregate? I'd rather discover which local business has the MOST openings and then register an account there, rather than g…

Thanks a ton for the feedback! Hope this could be helpful for your parents.

1. We decided to use geolocation because it removes one more form field. It also makes it easier to expand to additional countries (https://github.com/MiniCodeMonkey/curbside/issues) we may reconsider in the future.

2. Happy to explore adding additional ways to tackle the problem. For now, we just have a simple map of stores to visualize coverage: https://curb.run/stores

Fixed the typo. Thanks!