Amazon to Roll Out Grocery Delivery Service

http://mashable.com/2011/01/24/amazon-to-roll-out-grocery-delivery-service/

by andre3k1 • 16 years ago

52 56 16 years ago

shalmanese• 16 years ago

The reason why Amazon has thus far restricted Amazon Fresh to Seattle is because having vans in other cities would constitute a "business presence" which would then subject all of Amazon to sales tax in that state.

mlinsey• 16 years ago

Are you sure? As I understand it, Amazon Fresh LLC is a separate legal entity, just like Lab 126 and A9, both of which are based in California.

buss• 16 years ago

I'm not sure about that. A9 and Lab126 don't share office space with the rest of Amazon, but Fresh is right in my building.

brianbreslin• 16 years ago

I'd assume the reason they are only in Seattle is because the margins on grocery are slim and the logistics a nightmare. So they are dipping their toes into their home market first. Effectively eating their own dog food for lack of a better expression.

Launching in tons of cities requires lots of distribution points.

earl2• 16 years ago

I don't know -- A2Z is in SF just off Market street, the employees receive Amazon stock, get discounts on amazon.com, work exclusively (afaik) for amazon.com, and some lawyer has figured out how they aren't actually working for amazon and thus amazon doesn't pay ca taxes. Seems pretty much like outright theft to me.

http://public.a2z.com/index.html

nika5• 16 years ago

Amazon legally organizing their business so that they can avoid being forced (under threat of violence) to pay money to a state (that has proven it cannot responsibly spend it anyway) is not theft. It is, actually, theft avoidance. Theft is when you use force, or the threat of force, to take from someone to whome the property rightfully belongs. Taxation is closer to theft than tax avoidance.

nika5• 16 years ago

HomeGrocer was a previous attempt to deliver groceries this way that was started during the end of the dotcom boom.

The vans Amazon has in Seattle are all ex-Home Grocer vans. In the early days it was very obvious, though they've repainted them more carefully now.

I suspect Amazon picked them up cheap after HomeGrocer imploded.

wiredfool• 16 years ago

I'd be much more excited if Trader Joes did it. A lot of their stuff is already packaged/frozen, so it's just a small matter of taking the orders and shipping logistics.

InclinedPlane3• 16 years ago

Amazon in its entirety could be considered just a "small matter" of taking orders and shipping logistics.

Note: in practice neither of these things is a small matter.

marcc• 16 years ago

Awesome. I see yummy.com vans all around Santa Monica, but would love for a big player like Amazon to come in and validate this space. The article lists $2.50 for a single grapefruit as an indicator that the pricing will be high. I'd love to see a comparison. $2.50 for a grapefruit in mid January in Seattle might be a normal price for all I know. Show me pricing on staples like bread, flour, cereal, pasta.

TomOfTTB2• 16 years ago

I'd also like to see a comparison but I tend to think Amazon is charging a high price.

The thing I keep thinking is both WebVan and HomeGrocer blew threw billions and eventually imploded (WebVan bought HomeGrocer and then Amazon bought WebVan and re-purposed it as a regular online store). The argument always given was that grocery margins are already razor thin so a company that delivers groceries can't make enough to stay alive.

So maybe that's how Amazon is surviving in Seattle right now. Offering a great convenience at a premium price.

SoftwareMaven2• 16 years ago

If you haven't read the entire story of WebVan, it is worth it. Their problems stemmed from far more than just razor thin grocery margins and had much more to do with late-90's, bubble-fed hubris than anything else.

Unfortunately, WebVan scared anybody off from making a serious investment in it, even though they never actually invalidated the market. If anybody can make it work, it will be Amazon; and if they start succeeding, I can't imagine it will take long for Walmart to follow.

jarin2• 16 years ago

You also have to remember that startup and infrastructure costs were a LOT higher when WebVan and HomeGrocer started (although WebVan did go above and beyond the call of duty with their spending on top of that).

Amazon already has all of the technical infrastructure they need, so it's just a matter of keeping the storage and transportation costs down (e.g. not spending a billion dollars on a warehouse).

mkconor• 16 years ago

New Yorkers pay taxes on Amazon purchases. There are two or three other state where Amazon purchases are taxed as well. New York would be an ideal market for Amazon Fresh. Fresh Direct has whetted consumers' appetite for grocery delivery service while committing enough errors that Amazon could easily use their brand to gain significant market share.

InclinedPlane3• 16 years ago

Don't get too worked up about this, it's just an unsubstanitated rumor based on some very flimsy speculation.

InclinedPlane3• 16 years ago

A downvote, hilarious.

Might I interject a bit of rational skepticism here? What's the evidence behind this news, is there any? Or is it just an unfounded rumor promulgated by one website and picked up by others?

I'll just sit over here in the corner and watch this whole mess while I snack on a delicious bucket of popcorn.

nika5• 16 years ago

You're right. The fact that Amazon is running two trial services (fresh and tote) in the Seattle area does not substantiate the headline claim that amazon is going to roll out a grocery service nationwide.

Skepticism is merited here.

araneae• 16 years ago

I'm having flashbacks to the dot com bubble.

angdis• 16 years ago

Yep. You're thinking of kozmo. There was even a documentary made about the rise and spectacular fall of kozmo back in 2000. It was sort of a web-driven urban delivery service.

Amazon might be able to pull this off in some markets. It probably makes sense for folks with mobility issues.

I see it almost as an extension to mechanical turk.

latch2• 16 years ago

I know this might come off soapbox-ish, but I think preconception people have about your product/service can be helpful in identifying your message.

I like eating well+healthy and spending 20 minutes every couple days to buy fresh products seems like a small investment in both my body and wallet. There are things that having money is supposed to help us sweep under the rug - I'll never move anything bigger/heavier than a box from one house to another again. Nutrition shouldn't be one of those things. Nutrition and health should be one of those things that having all the spare money/time lets us get more, not less, involved in. The investment is moreso important if you have a family.

The fundamentals of nutrition, say how to pick a melon or how to understand nutritional labels, is as lacking as the fundamentals of personal finance. These delivery services can do well by specific groups (say the elderly), but in general, I worry that they'll make us further ignorant about nutrition.

SoftwareMaven2• 16 years ago

I find myself on my iPhone, hoping my 3G will work through the store walls, doing research as I shop. I would love to be able to do that research from home. I would be able to plan better, because I would know specifically what was on the shelves instead of making a list of generics and filling it in at the store.

To me, this sounds like a step in the right direction.

Roedou• 16 years ago

The Amazon Fresh service, as it is now, includes the 'nutrition panel' for all the products that have one.

This means you can do the same research as I imagine many of us do in the shop, from your browser, during the purchase process - and in something of a more structured way.

latch2• 16 years ago

Which is a good point for more processed foods. What about produce and meats? I lived most of my life in a northern climate..I'm used to produce being hit or miss during 1/2 the year. I've been to Seattle and the story is much better, so maybe my concerns are geographically sensitive.

jseifer• 16 years ago

If it was made by man then it's probably not good for you (exceptions: butter, coconut/olive oil). If you can't pronounce the name of an ingredient it's probably bad for you as well.

fireix• 16 years ago

Sears does this already with their mygofer.com service.

jarin2• 16 years ago

I've used Vons grocery delivery plenty of times in the past ($10-15 delivery charge, drivers not allowed to take tips), with pretty decent results.

If Amazon can improve on Vons' clunky ordering process and other problems (limited selection, substituted items can be way off and can change the total price quite a bit sometimes, fruit/veggies are sometimes bruised or not fresh) and keep their costs down, I think they will probably have a good shot at making it work.

olalonde• 16 years ago

For those who haven't heard of Webvan:

Webvan was an online "credit and delivery" grocery business that went bankrupt in 2001. [...] Webvan as one of the greatest dotcom disasters in history. [...] now owned and operated by Amazon.com.[1]

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Webvan

meterplech• 16 years ago

There have been a few attempts in this space, but I would love Amazon to succeed here. I wonder if this is timed because of their purchase of Diaper.com/Soap.com. That business had a true understanding of how to sort and deliver merchandize. Seems like this would be a great way to leverage that knowledge combined with Amazon's inventory.

Previous HN discussions: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1427668 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1877916

extension• 16 years ago

Upstream: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/bb320f30-2715-11e0-80d7-00144feab4...

(If you get the regwall, try entering the URL into Google and clicking the first result)

Hot damn have I got my pom poms on for this.

I'm getting mighty sick of the small selection of mostly junk at my one neighborhood supermarket, not to mention trudging out there in the bitter cold, finding they're out of my favorite snack, rummaging to find the latest expiry date, waiting in the checkout line, scrambling to cram everything in my bag, aaaand awkward interactions with pimply teenagers.

If this existed, I would eat much healthier, tastier, and cheaper.

And presumably, once Amazon has their own daily delivery network, they'll use it to ship all their other stuff overnight for free.

C'mon, if we can deliver hot pizza in 30 minutes then we can do fresh groceries in 24 hours.

rwmj2• 16 years ago

Every supermarket in the UK has a home delivery service, and has done for at least 5-10 years. I'm really surprised this isn't the case in the US [assuming you are in the US].

klbarry• 16 years ago

It is very rare in NYC outside of Manhattan, at least and when I've seen it the selection has been fairly horribly neutered.

russell_h• 16 years ago

Clearly, customers’ being able to order everyday home items online and have them delivered to their doors would put Amazon in further competition with big-box retailers. As an online bookstore, Amazon has given companies like Barnes & Noble and Borders a run for their money.

Am I the only one who checked the date on the article after seeing that?

dmnd• 16 years ago

I've been using Amazon Tote for a few months now. I didn't realise it was 'supposed' to be for groceries. There's a big selection of items that are available via Tote - I suspect it's everything Amazon has in it's local warehouse. The benefit for me is that shipping becomes free on all items, as long as I'm prepared to wait for the twice-weekly Tote drop day.

Also, they have never taken back the bags I left out for them. They are great for toting around board games though.

jamesteow• 16 years ago

Surprised no one here has chimed in with their experience with FreshDirect.

epynonymous• 16 years ago

what i didn't get from reading the article: is amazon procuring its own groceries or is it just providing delivery for stop and shop?

retube• 16 years ago

Amazon launched grocery deliveries in the UK a few months back - and to pretty mixed reviews. Amazon are using third parties to supply the goods, so one grocery order might be 4 or 5 separate deliveries. As a result the general view was a) it's expensive as you're having to pay shipping costs for each supplier (some comparisons of a typical basket were double the cost of getting it from Tesco or Sainsbury) 2) it generates a large amount of waste as each order is in separate packaging and c) it's really inconvenient having to be in for all these deliveries.

So basically a big thumbs down.

Eliezer• 16 years ago

Webvan! You came back! I thought you were dead! (Sobs.)

When Webvan died I literally had to buy a car for the first time. It was like I'd been part of an advanced civilization that collapsed. Seriously, they should've tried charging higher prices before they gave up.

pclark2• 16 years ago

You should move to the UK. Ocado (amongst others) offers grocery deliveries that you can order from your iPhone or iPad

Dn_Ab• 16 years ago

As do Asda, Tesco, Sainsbury. Allow you to order online to your home that is. Its more common than uncommon amongst the larger chains. It also seems self-check out is more prevalent/caught on quicker here. Tesco also has an API i think.

Curious what dynamics influence grocery stores from different regions to adopt tech with such varying levels of hesitation.

arethuza2• 16 years ago

Don't all the major UK supermarket chains provide online ordering and delivery?

klous• 16 years ago

If you're in Chicago or other covered areas out east, Peapod has been delivering groceries for a while. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peapod#Current_Locations

smackfu• 16 years ago

Yeah, the Stop & Shop tie-in here in CT works just fine. They even use the same weekly discounts as the real supermarket. I couldn't drive for a bit after an accident and it was invaluable to me. Amazon shouldn't even bother trying to compete here.

Semiapies• 16 years ago

If this pans out, then what I've been telling people for the last few years is true - we've hit the point in time when all the failed computing and internet ideas of the mid-late 90s can work out. Voice apps, PDAs, and now internet groceries?

curtisspope• 15 years ago

Kozmo.. er WebVan... Grocery Delivery is making a comeback

Amazon to Roll Out Grocery Delivery Service

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