The supermarkets have changed very little about the way they've done business in the last half-century, and as such I have a difficult time imagining them doing a good job executing on something like this.
I've also tested the majority of the meal and food delivery services out there, and my experience meshes well with the above: the local supermarket chain in some ways provides a better offering than anyone (as they should–you're absolutely right about that), but for a few years now they've persisted in making sure the actual execution is the worst I've experienced of any service. I can't see that changing until they completely overhaul their hiring practices and put sufficient processes in place to ensure good execution.
(For the record, Blue Apron strikes me as a pretty mediocre product at a pretty uninteresting price, executed in a pretty bad manner.)
I don't get what you mean by "ensure good execution" because it takes so little for grocers to successfully move into a market like Blue Apron's.
20 years ago, grocers destroyed the "fast casual roasted chicken" restaurants (Boston Market, Kenny Rogers Roasters) by simply buying chicken roaster machines and adding hot prepared food to the deli counter... and charging about a third the price. I'd hazard a guess that Safeway's chicken isn't as yummy[1] as Kenny Rogers' Roasters but that didn't stop anything.
So what about their execution is required here beyond "cheap and available where you already shop"? No one can use Blue Apron without a regular grocer in their routine already. Grocers successfully tapping into this higher margin product line seems inevitable, even if done with lower quality (is that what you mean?)
[1] - Or their neon sign as bright
It also took little more than a good website to compete with Amazon in the early days, but B&N/Borders/etc. never figured out a way to do it well.
What I want to do is order stuff with as little friction as possible, and have the right items delivered in a way that's convenient.
The chain delivery service we tried involved a few things:
1. A poor site experience. It had 'pantry' functionality, but it was anything but good. Putting together a large order took nearly as much time as doing it in person.
2. Delivery was scheduled during windows, windows that were often either missed, or perhaps worse, beat by many hours. They were often many hours outside the window. We eventually stopped including anything fresh in the order and would pick those up ourselves on days when we were hosting guests. That defeats much of the point.
It was like ordering groceries from the cable company.
3. We were able to select whether we'd want substitutions if something was unavailable. In virtually every order, we would either receive items (we didn't want) when we specified no substitutions, or didn't get substitutions when we wanted them. Often the substituted items were poorly chosen as stand-ins for what was unavailable.
4. It required a young male delivery guy to enter the home to deliver the items to the kitchen. It was a different person nearly every time. This is unacceptable for a number of reasons. Whenever substitution issues happened they seemed so disconnected from the process that it meant it never got better, and recourse took more time than it was worth.
Why a company with billions at its disposal and half a million employees can't get that right is somehow both a mystery, yet also a foregone conclusion.
While I seriously doubt Blue Apron poses much of a threat to the entrenched companies, I think someone else (perhaps Amazon) probably does.
Delivery slots are almost always adhered to, and if they're not the driver will call and tell you what's happening. Substitutions are pretty rare in my experience, and when they do happen you can refuse them at the door and the delivery driver will just remove it from your bill, I've also had more expensive items subbed in with no change to the amount I was charged. Drivers will generally ask if you want help, but will wait outside when asked.
Finally the web experience after a few orders is so much better than in store, and that's even with some awful UX in places. They track what you buy frequently and then show them as the first result in searches - I can do a full shop in twenty minutes or so now the site has been properly trained (they also feed loyalty card data in, so if you're already a frequent shopper with a chain its probably trained already).
Borders didn't try in the early days; when they got around to online retail, they outsourced it to Amazon. Much too late they tried their own...
B&N actually had a good website (it was always better than Amazon's for ordering books, IMO), they just weren't committed to competing with their own stores on price because the website was an "and, also..." not a bet-the-compaby deal.
Barnes & Noble gave a decent try, to this day maybe (haven't been on for a few years). They even got domains like books.com 20 years ago. But they would do the annoying thing many retailers did - consider the website secondary to their brick & mortar. Price things differently online, not accept an online price in-store and vice versa. B&N years later even did a decent job with the Nook. It still didn't get them anywhere.
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Which service did you use? I only know of Peapod in the US for big grocery chains. The prices were high. Though when they had items for sale, the cost would be equal to their in store cost or slightly lower. I never had an issue telling them to drop my stuff at my doorstep after the first time when I didn't want them to come inside. Each time I placed a big box or two at my doorstep for them to place my order into. I used Peapod maybe 15 times, on and off, between 2007-2010. That's ages ago for web times.
The big window range was annoying though later on they let you spend a bit extra to make it smaller. Rarely did they miss the time window I set. This all took place in central Jersey.
It felt figured out enough to me a decade ago. Maybe I'm an exception.
Why? Husbands/boyfriends think their housewife might be tempted?
I ageee with everything else about building a relationship regardless of age or gender of the delivery person.
I had the same problem with these services and having yet to have a single person deliver to me twice over 4 years, but that's regardless of whether they are a man,woman, or any other gender
From experience I'd agree that this is a correct observation, but perhaps a risky one to make considering recent discussions (among other things).
Again though, the charitable interpretation is that the poster did not really think about this statement too much, did not intend to cause offense, and might be quite open to the viewpoint that men are actually great at grocery shopping and assuming otherwise - however harmless it may seem to some people - is to be avoided.
I can't speak for anything else but I've become convinced that I should assume the charitable interpretation. If even writing this is considered an example of 'privilege' or sweeping real issues under the table, I truly and honestly want this to be pointed out and I'll seriously consider it in the progression of my personal views on these matters.
This is a bit of a sidenote, by the way, and not a direct response to your comment. I've just been thinking a bunch about all this lately, and your comment seemed a good a place as any to express myself :).
It's not 20 years ago, and “online for home delivery” is increasingly where people already shop. And, it's easy to displace a business that requires a trip out with one that requires a trip out, but one you were likely taking already. Harder to do that with something that doesn't require a trip out at all.
> No one can use Blue Apron without a regular grocer in their routine already.
Yes, you can. Cooking oil, salt, and black pepper—the only ingredients BA doesn't usually supply—don't require a traditional grocery or even one of the limited-area perishable delivery services to acquire. If BA is your only home cooking, you literally never need to enter a traditional grocery store, or order from a similar full-grown online delivery service. Google Express or Amazon in one of the areas where they don't have grocery delivery will work fine.
It was a great experience for us. I would recommend it.
I don't care for food. I know most people do. Most people care about variety and possibly some sort of cooking sometimes. I do cook chicken in bulk, but that's a pretty quick process. Otherwise I'm perfectly satisfied having the same 2 meals whenever I am at home for those meal times. One of them includes Soylent, the other includes 1-2 glasses of milk.
I can still go out and enjoy social lunch or dinner with business acquaintances or friends.
The only value adds Blue Apron gives are pre-portioning, recipes, and delivery.
That might not be worth 594 million (at last count).
Simply because you don't care about food doesn't mean nobody else does - in fact, you said that most people do care about food.
Exactly what value does your comment add to the conversation?
That answers both of your quite condescending questions.
Not a healthy option for everyday meals.
just to play devil's avocado, Amazon's advantage was not having the overhead of stores, now they just purchased whole foods. Seems as if they are moving towards being a supermarket
I remember Amazon's launch quite well, and I don't remember any of that sentiment. The first time I used Amazon I remember thinking "Wow, books are the perfect thing to sell online." I feel like it's become part of a standard origin mythology to play up the founder as "some kook with a crazy dream" that everyone else thought was insane. I think that's rarely the case, and is instead played up in an effort of founder worship.
And also people saying things like tiny businesses of people with bookstores in their spare time will make Amazon obsolete... https://mobile.nytimes.com/1999/02/26/opinion/foreign-affair...
Ah, Thomas Friedman. Thanks for the advice to not buy amazon stock in 1999.
Interestingly, if you view the entire stock history price chart, the dotcom bubble is barely a blip.
Semi-log (where constant percentage changes are constant-sized), it's more than a blip. Linear (where constant dollar changes are constant-sized) charting hides past market moves if the overall bias has been up and exaggerates past market moves if the overall bias has been down. This can lead investors to improperly discount the pain/gain cycle that happened over that time period.
Linear charting: http://bit.ly/2tk5Ulj
Semi log: http://bit.ly/2sJs7ec
I wasn't even in middle school/junior high when I and some other classmates started using Amazon. We loved using it for getting books. There was no weirdness about it. In fact, in my memories, using Amazon was completely normal and seemed like a good idea. This would be in 2000 and 2001.
I can imagine the headlines. “AVOCADO TOAST FAD MAY BE LINKED TO DEVIL WORSHIP”
You'd be amazed at how good entrenched companies are at completely failing to understand what their competitive advantage even is, let alone using it.
UK supermarkets seem to have made huge changes, online shopping and delivery is really common, self scanning (which I always use), loyalty points used across multiple vendors (e.g. getting points for paying utility bills), "metro" urban stores etc.
Edit: I'm not doubting that there are some - just wondering how it differentiates itself from other players in this market, particularly when Amazon isn't a brand I associate with product quality.
The difference to me is that Amazon competed aggressively on price and selection. You could get books or items which you just couldn't get in a local Borders. You could also get the same item significantly cheaper than a Borders or Barnes and Noble.
Blue Aprons value lies in the recipe and the convenience of having all the ingredients picked out for you, but charges a significant premium. I would like this as a way to try new recipes or expand my range (e.g. I don't stock ingredients/spices etc at home for Chinese food), but not as my go-to option for daily meals.
It may not be as easy for someone like whole-foods or Safeway to generate recipes, efficiently package/put-together ingredients etc, but I also feel the value addition is much less than someone like Amazon's was: More items and much cheaper.
You really should visit a Wegmans.
Aside: I've never heard a single good thing about OnTrac.
Those constraints would seem to be the only reason another startup, curbside, continues to exist :-)
EDIT: including some extra deets about their size (since that was your primary argument against it happening) -> $34B in Revenue (2016), Operating Income $2.94B (2016), Assets of $17.46B, and 200,000+ employees.
Quite solid in price/friendliness/quality.
[0] https://www.ica.se/handla-online/ica-matkassen/ https://www.coop.se/handla-online/matkasse/ https://www.citygross.se/mat/matkasse/klassisk-matkasse/ https://www.hemkop.se/matkassar
1) Here and there they have recipes involving ingredients not easily found in local stores 2) They deliver it to me
If I have to go to the store anyways, and presumably using ingredients they have there already, it has no value to me.
Because, based on supermarket prices for similarly sized packages, it won't be 50% of the cost, and because the additional time for a supermarket stop takes up enough time to basically make it a wash, considering the money value of time, for people in the target market even if it was 50%.
Obviously I'm incredibly privileged in the sense that I am in a comfortable financial position and can afford to use these services.
Edit: I should probably also add that neither myself or my partner can drive, so getting groceries is a bus ride / hoping that the small shops in walking distance have what you need (reasonable for salt/pepper/cooking oil/pasta/rice, not so much for anything more 'exotic').
Think it depends where you live. My nearby grocery store makes/serves fresh pizza, take out dinners (different each night), the usual rotisserie chickens (that are all gone by 7), in store made sushi (to order if you're there at the right time), has an asian and american hot bar, and provides a drive through grocery pick up service.
I did BA some in the past, but now I have a bunch of recipes and just order the ingredients online and pick them up at a drive through on the way home. It's cheaper, and almost as convenient. The store will also deliver, but I'm okay saving the fee since it's so easy to pick up.
Is this Texas? Because it sounds like the most wonderful place known as HEB.
Whole Foods 365, for example, is an attempt to move the industry in the opposite direction by carrying far less than a standard market. You can certainly make delicious meals from the 365 inventory but can't necessarily fulfill a given recipe with the inventory at 365 or even a standard grocer. This is a common problem when 'cooking to the recipe'.
(though I'd agree this probably isn't enough on it's own to save blue apron)
[Edit: But FWIW, I do buy that Blue Apron is fucked.. competition just isn't the reason]
Now I could buy the argument that the supermarket chains just won't be able to attract the appropriate talent to deliver an experience rivaling that of Blue Apron (or Amazon, if they decided to get into this market tomorrow via Whole Foods).
Consider, for instance, the logistics for someone who doesn't own a car.
Right, exactly. Some of these replies are incredible! Absolutely if you live somewhere more remote you'll need a car, but for people in urban areas...?
I've lived in several quite different cities over the last decade and haven't owned a car the entire time and have managed to buy groceries just fine. No Amazon Fresh or eating out regularly required...
Sure, you can live pretty much anywhere without a car - but you are now in the extreme minority trying to make that work and likely are making significant lifestyle changes/sacrifices to do so. I grew up without a car in my household in a very midwest giant-suburb style metro area, and it was truly a different lifestyle. I would not go back to that.
However, living in Chicago without a car is an amazing liberating experience, not the hinderance it was elsewhere.
as we got busier our 1-2 weekly home cooked meals dropped to once per every two weeks, and my partner loves cooking and she's very good at it, never thought she was the audience for a meal kit.
she ended up getting a job at Plated. Now we cook 2-3 times a week and end up spending more time together as a result.
the cost is not trivial (and of course we have access to employee discount) but it's certainly less expensive than almost any take out meal in NYC.
i don't know what the long term situation is like but i could see it always doing well at least in a city like new york
Also I don't really understand why nobody is addressing that a grocery store can just buy a van and deliver to you within the hour if necessary, but easily at least same day. What do I do with Blue Apron if I need something now?
Oh and don't forget that it's a simple market to get into, and will absolutely have razor-thin margins if they want to stay in business.
They are dead on arrival.
Edit:we also ended up eating out at about an average of 2.5 nights a week every year which is much higher than when I lived in a rural area with a car
I'd be interested to know whether a typical person's idea of what "walking distance" is has decreased or not over recent years.
I guess dense apartment buildings far from grocery stores are kind of an anachronism, but that's segregated residential/commercial zoning for you.
This is in a medium-sized (~1 million people) European city; I gather your milage may vary in an American city, though I assume the ones where people tend to not have cars are mostly fairly dense.
Either via home delivery (so, not people who would use a curbside drop off), posdibly, in some areas, through Amazon Prime Fresh, or in smaller, more frequent trips walking or with a bike, or they don't regularly, and they just eat out and work with non-perishables at home.
You're assuming that everyone who doesn't have a car is poor, which isn't necessarily true.
Is there anything here that would get in the way of supermarkets usual model? All I can think of is that a package of ingredients would have to have a sell by date of the item that goes out of date the quickest and they would require staff for preparation (e.g. adding only one clove of garlic, packaging up a tablespoon of soy sauce).
While I agree they're in trouble, i really don't think it'll be supermarkets that hurt them. Supermarkets are about as likely to rise up as Blackberry is about to destroy Apple.
As far as I can tell, these services sell you the same head of lettuce as the grocery, at a large markup. Just because you think that Safeway, QFC, and Costco won't figure out this business doesn't mean that some other grocery chain won't.
Grocery stores have a fundamental advantage in this game - they have a location where people who don't want to pay for delivery can pick up. They can absolutely compete on price, without sacrificing any quality. On the other hand, it doesn't matter how much a BlackBerry costs - it was not an iPhone.
Several are working on identical services where you pick up, curbside, the ingredients and instructions in a bag, and pay significantly less for doing so.
Why have your ingredients mailed to you when a supermarket on your way home will offer the same thing for 50% cheaper?