CLICK AND RECEIVE

Amazon’s speedy new service brings you groceries (and furniture) in a flash.

FOR THOSE WHO VALUE immediate gratification, life in Milwaukee just got a little bit rosier. The addition of a small but buzzing Amazon Fulfillment Center on Mitchell Street near Miller Park Way means the city is eligible for Prime Now, the ultra-fast delivery service (available to people with an Amazon Prime membership, which costs $99 annually) promising box-on-doorstep service in under an hour for $7.99 – and if you have the patience to wait for up to two hours, delivery is free. While the selection is but a tiny fraction of Amazon’s full inventory, it wasn’t short on big-ticket items as of early summer. Among the offerings were a nail gun, keyboard and drum machine, gas-powered camp stove, girl’s mountain bike, electric lawn mower, Three Stooges box set, fully functioning 3D printer and a $2,300 iMac.

Prime Now in Milwaukee also offers a limited selection of food and furniture, so we attempted to put the service through its paces with one very fragile delivery and another back-breaking one.

Order #1: Delivered to the Third Ward in 19 minutes

ORGANIC VALLEY EXTRA LARGE BROWN EGGS, 2 DOZEN;

JULIE’S ORGANIC VANILLA ICE CREAM SANDWICHES; BEN AND JERRY’S ICE CREAM, AMERICONE DREAM, 16 OUNCES; PERRIER SPARKLING LEMON, 4 PACK BOTTLES; SAN PELLEGRINO SPARKLING NATURAL MINERAL WATER, 1 LITER BOTTLE Prime Now often uses Amazon Flex drivers, who, like Uber drivers, are independent contractors operating their own cars. According to the Now site, which lets you follow your driver, our fast-moving “Felix” booked it down Interstate 94 to deliver this bundle costing slightly more than the $25 limit, all without cracking an egg or bottle or thawing the ice cream, which came with an ice pack and, if anything, was frozen too hard. Not bad.

Order #2: Delivered to the Third Ward in 46 minutes

ADIDAS PERFORMANCE FLAT TRAINING BENCH This workout bench made mostly of steel came in a long cardboard box that weighed somewhere north of 30 pounds and arrived at our doors in good condition. We apparently bought the last one, pending restocking (or close to it), because the following day, the product was no longer listed.