Getting the products into customers’ homes is perhaps the central challenge for retailers seeking to address those consumers’ convenience demands with effective delivery services. Amazon has long enjoyed dominance in these logistics efforts, but Walmart is seeking to take a different approach that might grant it a unique competitive advantage in a sector where Amazon has yet to succeed fully: grocery delivery.
Combining novel technology with old-fashioned personalized service, Walmart’s InHome Delivery service promises to get people’s cold food items into their refrigerators, on time and conveniently, even without them being at home. Customers who sign up for the service need to have a smart lock system on the doors of their homes. Then they place and order, and a Walmart employee collects the grocery and other items, comes to their house, gains access, and stocks their pantries, freezers, and refrigerators. For the entire time the delivery employee is in the home, a wearable camera will transmit that person’s precise location and activity, so the customer can track exactly what happens during each delivery.
Beyond these technological features, the service promises a sort of personal connection with the person providing it. Customers can read the biographies of the delivery personnel, filled with personal details. Walmart also has noted the extent to which it is training these employees, encouraging them to act as if they were entering the home of a close friend or family member. Other training sessions focus on optimal ways to organize pantries and refrigerators, so when the customer arrives home, all the products are well stocked, clearly visible, and easily accessible.
These efforts reflect Walmart’s sense that the grocery sector is where it should be focusing its future delivery initiatives. Although Amazon’s Key by Amazon service also requests that customers give the retailer access to some area of their home through smart lock technology (e.g., garages), it does not include groceries among the items available through this service. The idea is more to hide the packages from potential thieves, not to ensure their freshness. Walmart also has gained some ground in the grocery sector with its popular curbside pickup service, such that it already has some capacities in place to ensure that employees select good quality produce for customers.
Still, many consumers continue to express concerns about allowing anyone else to pick their fruit and vegetables. If they already are skeptical about this element, they might be even more suspicious about the viability of letting a stranger into their houses, to peer into their refrigerators. The growth of the smart lock market implies that people increasingly are accepting the idea of letting others in when they are not home, but it remains a salient perceived risk factor that Walmart will need to overcome.
Discussion Questions:
- What is Walmart doing to improve its delivery service?
- As a potential customer, would you partake in this enhanced delivery service? Why or why not? What would Walmart need to do to convince you to try it?
Source: Jeff Wells, Retail Dive, June 7, 2019