AmazonFresh: Can it Succeed Where HomeGrocer and Webvan Failed?
The knock on the door at 9 AM sent me back to 1999 in a flash…
In the summer of 1999, I was newly hired into an Internet startup and living in a tiny little house just blocks from Bill Gates (yes, that Bill Gates). I opened my door to a young man holding out bags of groceries bearing the image of a peach and the name “HomeGrocer.com.”
As a fledgling Internet geek, I was thrilled to be able to use the Web for everything! So when I discovered I could get my groceries delivered direct to my doorstep, including produce carefully selected just for me, I had to try it.
Flash forward to April, 2009, and I once again opened my door to a friendly young man holding out bags of groceries, this time with the name “AmazonFresh.” This time I was a little more skeptical about the cost and quality.
In full disclosure, I have to admit that my husband and I have been Amazon fans for more than a decade. Our house is full of books and CDs, and we’ve ordered camera equipment, computer equipment, and just about everything else through the company.
So when an email came through telling us that AmazonFresh was finally available in our neighborhood, we had to try it.
This time the peach has been replaced with a radish(?) but the concept is still the same. Order from an online grocery store and get free delivery, either “unattended” delivery to a special container on your doorstep or delivery when someone can accept it.
It’s an especially good concept for the elderly, the disabled, overworked wage earners, and folks living in city condos where there aren’t any “real” supermarkets.
From a well-organized truck, our delivery person brought us the same products we would have gotten from our twice-monthly shopping trips to the nearest food co-op. The prices were comparable, only slightly more expensive in a few cases, and the produce was particularly well selected. It matched the quality we would have chosen except for one thing: there were no organic produce options.
We were rewarded with some nice gifts for our first order: the bunch of flowers you see on the table was a “welcome” gift, the sample produce bag was free with our first order, and we received the requisite thank you card and shopping list notepad.
How would I rank the experience and quality a decade later? Much better! It’s clear Amazon has learned something from their predecessors. And the company is also taking full advantage of systems they have in place to make the process more efficient and cost effective.
Where are HomeGrocer.com and Webvan now?
In June 2000, Webvan bought HomeGrocer.com in a stock deal worth $1.2 billion. The merged company hit the streets just as the “dot com bubble” began losing air, and by July 2001, the company filed for Chapter 11, auctioned off its assets, fired 2,000 employees, and stopped deliveries to 750,000 customers in Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, Chicago, and Southern California.
HomeGrocer is not dead, however. Google “HomeGrocer” and you will turn up this page. Note in the upper right hand corner – “part of the amazon.com family…” Looks like Amazon has gotten the last laugh, after all.
Assuming, that is, that Amazon doesn’t make the same mistakes that its forbears did and leverages its knowledge of online customer behavior, efficient warehousing, and timely – and low cost – delivery.
