Stop & Shop offers faster grocery delivery
Stop & Shop is rolling out an ultra-fast grocery delivery service, upping the ante in the competition to attract customers who favor convenience over roaming supermarket aisles.
The Quincy, Mass.-based chain is partnering with third-party retail delivery provider Instacart for what it calls Stop & Shop Express: shoppers with an Instcart Express membership, along with a $10 minimum order and a $2.99 delivery fee, can get Stop & Shop orders delivered in as fast as 30 minutes
There is no limit on the amount of groceries consumers can order via Stop & Shop Express. And they also can shop from the more than 30,000 convenience items including prepared foods, snacks, beverages, paper goods, cleaners and baby products when ordering via Stop & Shop Express.
The service is available seven days a week, according to company officials, who said it is available as long as Stop & Shop stores are open, which is as early as 6 a.m. and as late as midnight. The grocery chain is the first supermarket in the Northeast to make this service available through Instacart, according to Stop & Shop officials.
Gordon Reid, president of Stop & Shop. said “customers’ lives are busier than ever, and this service will help make things easier for them.”
Health concerns related to the COVID-19 pandemic has increased the popularity of home delivery of groceries.
Stop & Shop first entered into a partnership with Instacart in 2017 to offer its customers same-day delivery. Officials with the supermarket chain then expanded its arrangement with Instacart to 321 locations, making same-day, contactless delivery accessible from more than 75 percent of its stores.
Chris Rogers, vice president of retail at Instacart, said the service allows customers to order everything from “last-minute baking or dinner ingredient to toothpaste and paper goods.”
“We’re thrilled to give customers an easier and faster way to access their convenience shopping needs,” Rogers said in a statement.
Wayne Pesce, president of the Connecticut Food Association, said it remains to be seen whether Stop & Shop Express will provide the chain with a competitive advantage over its rivals.
“It’s a real convenience for customers, though, if they’ve forgotten some ingredient for something they are cooking or need something and don’t have time to pick it up themselves,” Pesce said.
Stop & Shop’s Dutch corporate parent, Ahold Delhaize, was an early adapter in the e-commerce and online grocery shopping area, acquiring Peapod, which was an early leader in that market segment.
Stop & Shop has since brought Peapod into its own business and it is now known as Stop & Shop Home Delivery. It will deliver groceries in as little as four hours.
In September, in another move to grab market share from its rivals in five states including Connecticut, Stop & Shop launched a program in which, if a perishable product purchased in any of of its stores doesn’t meet a customer’s standards for freshness and quality, they can return it and get double their money back.
Stop & Shop’s Freshness Guarantee covers any perishable product purchased in the store’s meat, seafood, produce, dairy, bakery, floral or deli departments. For returns of products purchased via home delivery and online orders picked up at the store, Stop & Shop will refund perishable items in orders that were delivered or picked up within the past seven days. Purchases must be verified before being refunded to the original form of payment.
Stop & Shop has more 400 stores in five states including 90 in Connecticut.