HEB grocery stores has partnered with Instacart, and is now offering 1 hour delivery service. As with any service, it's important to check into the terms, but it seems the delivery charges are pretty reasonable, at least in my opinion. I wasn't aware of Instacart before now, but also be aware the article states that some item costs might be higher than in-store costs, due to the personal shopper aspect of the service.Log In
We don't have HEB in this area. I think the only grocer that offers home delivery is Giant via their peapod service. Even that though is not very close to here, so I doubt they would deliver out where I live. If they did, they would no doubt charge a delivery surcharge. On top of their already high prices I will not parktake.
Most grocery stores, especially from the larger companies, offer delivery services today. Only the largest grocers can provide one-hour delivery, though, because of the precision and infrastructure needed to succeed. The delivery charges are more than reasonable, considering the convenience it provides to customers. I use delivery from Vons all the time, and I'm more than willing to pay $10 to get my groceries delivered to my door step. That is easily offset by the extra hour of time I have and the gas I would spend driving.
@Ke Gordon I also live on the outskirts, and my neighborhood is not served by this, or pretty much any other type of delivery service, other than standard mail and package deliveries. I hope at some point they do expand out this way, though, because there are others as well as myself who would be happy to partake. As @troutski mentioned, there is a convenience factor, and when time and travel are factored in, it is often cost effective to use this type of service. I know the Peapod service was very popular when I lived in Massachusetts, because many people there didn't have vehicles, and so having groceries delivered was a definite boon, despite the extra expenses.
I'm surprised at how cheap they are for delivery - I wonder how much they pay their employees to do all this, in addition to how much profit they make off the deal. The article states that they charge $6 for a one hour delivery time, or $4 for a two hour delivery time - that's not even minimum wage. I certainly wouldn't go grocery shopping for someone for that much. I'm thinking they probably have some deal negotiated with certain stores to get some percentage of a discount which they then keep as a profit, for the added benefit of driving more business to their stores overall. In other words they are reaching out to customers that the stores normal marketing methods wouldn't usually drive business from. I don't quite understand what their explanation is for the added expense per some items "due to the personal shopper aspect" of the service. Do they charge more for making the shopper pick up embarrassing or personal items like condoms or lube or lice kits, lol?
