Walmart Online Grocery Delivery Service Tested In California

CHICAGO: Wal-Mart Stores Inc has begun testing an online grocery delivery service in San Jose, California, a company spokesman said on Saturday.

The world's biggest retailer had been rumored to be considering dipping its toe into online grocery delivery for the past few years.

The "Walmart To Go" test allows customers to visit Walmart.com to order groceries and consumables found in a Walmart store and have them delivered to their homes, the spokesman said.

Products include fresh produce, meat and seafood, frozen, bakery, baby, over-the-counter pharmacy, household supplies and health and beauty items.

No other details were immediately available.

The online grocery business has proven difficult to succeed in given the perishability of fresh food and the industry's small profit margins, analysts have said.

If WalMart decides to stay and expand in the online grocery delivery business, its competition would include Peapod and Amazon Fresh.

Walmart's U.S. grocery business generated about $140.6 billion in sales last year, up 2.1 percent from the previous year, according to a recent media report.

Groceries accounted for 54 percent of the company's total U.S. revenue in the year ended January 31, the company's fiscal 2011. The figures exclude Sam's Club stores.

(Reporting by Matthew Lewis; editing by Philip Barbara)

Copyright 2010 Thomson Reuters. Click for Restrictions.

Comments

[sonche]

01:13 PM on 05/18/2011

I'm looking at this because I've been needing a delivery service for myself and my wife. Both of us are disabled. I have been my wife's caretaker for 13 years. I am 10 years older than her. I served my country in combat. I am college educated. I've had several jobs the last one lasted 27 years. I have a need and I'm looking to where that need might be fulfilled. If Walmart has the foresight to fill that need, I'll be their customer. If someone else fills that need, I'll take a look at what they offer. I've already looked in the yellow pages etc. and have talked to many local store managers with no luck and no interest so here I am. I am not a pig.

[teabagflush]

08:31 AM on 04/26/2011

When they show up at your door with those on-line grocery products, be sure to check expiration dates before you pay the delivery boy.

[esq1128]

12:32 AM on 04/26/2011

I've used it for delivery of 20 pounds of Purina dry dog food for 97 cents delivery cost. It sure beats going to the store and lugging 20 pounds of dry dog food arround. We have a Great Dane and a Chiweenie. The Chiweenie eats more than our Great Dane. Go Figure.

[HBINLA]

12:59 PM on 04/30/2011

What is a "Chiweenie?"

[Arts4u]

07:11 PM on 04/25/2011

Can't Walmart keep its nose out of anything? It's like a rude in-law who just won't go away.

[BlueZoo]

04:17 PM on 04/25/2011

Why would anyone buy groceries from Wal-Mart anyway? I recently did four weeks of comparison shopping between Wal-Mart and three supermarkets in my area (Publix, Kroger and Ingles) and Wal-Mart had the highest prices of all of the stores each and every week. They may have "come-on" prices for one or two things but they negate that saving by what their other goods cost! Aside from that, their grocery departments are dim and dirty and I wouldn't shop there anyway!

[Patriot86]

09:02 AM on 04/26/2011

I have been saying this for years...I do better shopping local then at Walmart...the only thing that is cheaper right now at Walmart is milk and organic chicken...that is it folks.

[novaguy1968]

11:04 AM on 04/26/2011

Completely opposite of where I live. Safeway, Giant, Harris Teeter are all higher in nearly every item compared to Walmart; next in line is Shoppers and Wegmans. One of my favorites, Balck Forest ham, $6.99 Walmart--all other stores $9.99. I generally shop nowhere else, except to maybe refill on milk or break between my once-monthly grocery run.

[ianmcc]

02:38 PM on 04/25/2011

So now the obese great unwashed masses who shop at Walmart now don't even have to get off the couch to go up and down aisles with a cart? Walmart's dream come true, get rid of their cashiers and ship directly from the warehouse.

I went to a Walmart once back in the late 80's before their practices were known. Even then I could tell everything in there was cheaply made and I thought even Goodwill seemed like a better place to shop. I've never been back since.

[sdesign]

12:22 PM on 04/25/2011

Bring me my food! I'M HUNGRY.. what a bunch of pigs.

[DixieMelody]

12:49 PM on 04/25/2011

So. . .

The elderly and disabled who are housebound, isolated, most need this service are "pigs"?

[sdesign]

01:40 PM on 04/25/2011

No. Badly worded on my part. I'm refering to those who are too lazy to drive, walk or bike to a store.
If ChinaMart can't deliver /free of charge/ to their elderly, disabled or housebound customers, then they are pigs. Must a profit be realized for everything we do in this country?

[AngelaQuattrano]

07:16 AM on 04/26/2011

Some of us don't have cars. Walking to the store to drag home heavy items takes a lot of my time, which could be spent working and making money.

[mrsm00the]

11:58 AM on 04/25/2011

Walmart is a tough place to figure out. It is strongly anti-union, pays the lowest wages, give its employees inadequate health benefits and has crappy working conditions, but it's like a magnet for Democrat shoppers.

[sdesign]

12:01 PM on 04/25/2011

What is a democrat shopper? Mrs. Moothe.

[mrsm00the]

12:04 PM on 04/25/2011

The ones with more tatoos than teeth.

[Linda from Deerfield]

01:01 PM on 04/25/2011

Where did you see that study? You won't catch me there. -- Regards, A Democrat

[Linda from Deerfield]

11:47 AM on 04/25/2011

Much as I would hate to give Walmart a win, if I was one of those little corner market guys in the poor neighborhoods, under threat of being put out of business by Walmart, I would use this on-line thing to stock my little store and mark things up minimally and keep my neighbors happy and keep this destructive beast away -- might even open a bunch of new markets to solve the problem of people finding it difficult to use public transportation for groceries.

[Boots in Their Snoots]

11:36 AM on 04/25/2011

Fuel prices and labor prices make this a very expensive luxury. Consider this ; the I.R.S. gives a half dollar per mile deduction for business vehicle use. An example of 100 miles per day is a reasonable goal and at 20 miles per gallon that's 5 gallons of $4 gas = $20 for fuel. Minmum wage workers WITH fringe bennies= roughly $100 per day. That's $120 per day. Divide that by number of deliveries say 1 every 20 minutes=24 per day. So add at the very minimum $5 per order, not counting tips, damages by workers, spoilage of perishibles, accidents, sick days, car breakdowns and maintenance, etc. Is it still worth it?

[sdesign]

12:06 PM on 04/25/2011

If it's a company vehicle, all expenses of the vehicle are deductable. To include fuel, repairs, maintenance, car wash - everything. The 50 cents per mile is personal vehicle used for business purpose.

[Boots in Their Snoots]

03:29 PM on 04/25/2011

Thanks for reminding me, you gotta buy a vehicle too. BTW as a professional in the trans business, 50 cents is the deduction for ALL vehicles, UNLESS you choose to deduct actual expenses instead. It's one or the other.

[nfatt1]

10:58 AM on 04/25/2011

Billion dollar a year industries don't have small profit margins.

[hidenout3]

11:04 PM on 04/25/2011

Groceries garner very, very small profit margins, in case you didn't know. Net margins in the 5 to 7% range.

[Patriot86]

09:06 AM on 04/26/2011

Walmart is the most prosperous company in America.

[laura r]

10:22 AM on 04/25/2011

People I know here do not shop at Wal-Mart--- They like Target better.

Here is a quote from 1806- 1850 For Wal-Mart

“They will come to learn in the end, at their own expense, that it is better to endure
competition for rich customers than to be invested with monopoly over impoverished customers.”
– Frederic Bastiat (1801-1850 ), French economist, statesman and author

[DixieMelody]

12:42 PM on 04/25/2011

This is about delivering groceries. . .

[Arts4u]

02:25 PM on 04/26/2011

Nope - Walmart is about far more than delivering groceries. Miss the point much?

[muck-raker]

09:55 AM on 04/25/2011

for the readers here: Yet here I am awake and patting out tortillas, haunted by the empire that I have called home most of my life.

I like to think that, for the most part, I no longer live up there in the U.S., but southward of its ticking social, political and economic bombs. Because the US debt bomb has not yet gone off, Social Security still exists, and the occasional royalty check or book advance still comes in, allowing me to remain here. And so long as America's perverse commodities economy keeps stumbling along and making lifelike noises, so long as the American people accept permanent debt subjugation -- I can drink, think and burn tortillas. Believe me, I take no smugness in this irony.

Continue reading "Round Midnight: Tortillas and the Corporate State" »
http://www.joebageant.com/joe/page/4/
scroll down to balance of good read

[Gil76]

09:27 AM on 04/25/2011

It's an interesting idea. I would consider it; I don't have a car and it would be worth it for me to have groceries delivered to my home.

[sdesign]

12:18 PM on 04/25/2011

Check the yellow pages or your local grocer - it's been going on for many many years.

[DixieMelody]

12:44 PM on 04/25/2011

Albertsons did it for awhile for a flat charge of $9.95.

Worth every penny.

[ian0000]

09:24 AM on 04/25/2011

i dont get all the wall mart bashing. i have driven through many towns through the mid west and south with a wall mart on the edge of town and yes the main st of the town looks like a ghost town. but wall mart can't start up in these towns without community support . if the community doesn't want a wall mart then it can't get the all the zoning approvals to start up. and when did you see a wall mart that isn't packed. the average shopper loves wall mart. people are voting with their wallets.

[sdesign]

12:11 PM on 04/25/2011

I'm sure those people are very happy with their decision. A big crap selling box on the outside of town and a town center that really ought to be bulldozed flat.
A town center that used to bustle with neighbors passing by and kids playing in the square.

[sensimilla]

01:58 PM on 04/25/2011

the average shopper loves wall mart.

no, the average shopper hates that they can only "afford" walmart, not realizing that their products are complete crapola.

Buy quality, and it will pay for itself over time.