London is finally catching up with the US after a super-fast grocery delivery service was launched promising deliveries within the hour.
Pocket Shop is an Instacart-style delivery website for the chronically time strapped and employs a network of local pickers to pop down to Sainsbury's or Tesco for you. M&S and Waitrose services are currently being added.
The exact choice of service depends on your postcode because your avatar shopper (the Financial Times says there are 20 around the capital) heads, on foot, down to the nearby store before heading to your home.
The start-up was founded last November and supported by a £300,000 investment from London-based Forward Labs. Techcrunch reported that the service was initially trialed in North London. It delivered 3,500 items during a month long test in Camden. The Pocket Shop website says it now serves 'the whole of London' but asks customers to enter their post codes to ensure they are included.
A one-hour delivery costs £6.50 with slightly cheaper two-hour slot at £5.50 and three hour at £5.10. Pocket Shop admits that it charges a cut on top of supermarket prices but says prices are comparable with convenience store prices. Minimum orders are £20 plus the service cost.
It plans to offer free delivery in future on orders over a certain amount and will also incorporate supermarket 'offers,' such as two-for-ones. Techcrunch also reports that it asks staff to select the best fruit and vegetables and not battered, bruised or unripe products.
The FT newspaper says the system uses 'a GPS-based algorithm similar to those used by taxi-ordering smartphone apps' to direct orders and alert their on-foot buyers.
A similar service Instacart was founded in San Francisco last year and is backed by $10.8 million of equity funding.
Pocket Shop founder Hemel Kuntawala describes the target market as the 'hard core' of supermarket customers who order a weekly online shop but then need to top-up midweek.
However, the FT quoted the IMRG's policy officer Andrew McClelland arguing that he thought demand would be 'light'.
People are so busy these days with work, career and kids. The last thing that most people want to do is spend an hour or more at the grocery store. Luckily for them,
ReplyDeletethere is grocery delivery services in some cities in the Texas,United States, that will shop and deliver their orders for them.
grocery delivery service