Online Grocery Shopping Takes Longer Than In Store?
from the yes,-but... dept
A somewhat misleading study coming out of the UK suggests that online grocery shopping takes longer than going to the store and buying stuff yourself. There are a few things wrong with the study. First, it doesn’t appear to count the time it takes to get to and from the store. Second, it doesn’t take into account the convenience of not having to go out to get the groceries. Finally, and most importantly, it assumes that every time you shop online you start from scratch. Most online grocery services let you keep a regular shopping list. So, yes, the first time may take a bit longer, but every time after that should be much faster.
Comments on “Online Grocery Shopping Takes Longer Than In Store?”
Delivery Schedules
Last time I checked, those services usually take at least a day before they can deliver. I’m not going to wait that long to buy a gallon of milk or a jar of peanut butter.
Re: Delivery Schedules
No one said that one is perfect for everything. The study was suggesting, in a misleading way, that the actual shopping took less time. That’s not telling the full story.
I agree with you on the instant gratification point, which is part of the reason I don’t use any online grocery shopping service myself.
Re: Delivery Schedules
Of COURSE you’re going to wait a day to get more Peanut Butter. What, you can’t plan even a day ahead? You must always be running out of dryer sheets and TP.
You probably spend far too much money, with that poor planning and impulse control.
Schedule your purchases, stick to your lists, don’t be such a whiny baby, all these things halp one save money and maintain a balanced house and body.
Plus, it means less time driving, a habit which kills more americans than smoking.
Couch Potatoes
Shopping whilst watching TV is far more enjoyable than spending an hour pushing a trolley round a store, then waiting in line for the checkout.
As you quite rightly pointed out – retrieving a previous shopping list makes repeat ordering painless and trivial.
No Subject Given
Here we have IGA that offers online shopping.
When we first moved to our current neighborhood we used it.
My impressions is that in general it IS more convenient because it takes very little time to list your order (and it does save your list) and you don’t have to actually GO to the store, plus the delivery fees were reasonable (about the same as taking a taxi to return with groceries since we don’t have a car).
However, that being said, we stopped using it for many reasons…
– You needed 48 hours lead time for an order (while in and of itself its no biggie, but it sometimes caused a few problems)
– 1 in 3 times approx, its hit or miss, we didn’t get items we had ordered (and therefore had to actually go to another store to get the other half of the groceries, erasing the convenience…this was even more frustrating when once we went back to the IGA that delivered that same day and FOUND the item on the shelf when our order listed it as out)
– also about 1 in 4 times we would get very unacceptable substitution of items, sometimes for slightly more expensive ones (which is something the web site says they do not do).
– 1 in 10 times, we’ve gotten no delivery at all because of a “misplaced” order.
– the main reason is that going to another grocery chain in the area and taking a taxi, we are now spending as much as 30-40$ LESS than the IGA chain on weekly groceries averaging (now) 90-100$. Savings too good to ignore for the “convenience” of web shopping.
All in all, I love the IDEA of web grocery shopping, but in all things, sometimes the execution doesn’t work properly, is too expensive or not well thought out. IGA has a good site, but the service which is basically average, with a few annoyances isn’t enough to keep me as a customer when prices are MUCH lower elsewhere.
American Couch Potatoes
Online grocery shopping really isn’t designed to give ” instant gratification “. I doubt I would use this method of grocery shopping unless I am purchasing staples and items I want to stock up on. Now if someone were to come up with a ” lunch wagon ” moble grocery where say I could dial the drivers cell # and request either a loaf of bread or a gallon of milk out of his rolling stock, or his stop @ a shop plus a markup for his services … Well THEN I think Instant Gratification grocery shopping will take off …
stating the obvious
and we needed a study to figure that out?
Re: stating the obvious
American have a study done for everything.