Dive Brief:
- Giant Food has reduced or eliminated fees and order minimums for purchases made through its in-house e-commerce services, the grocer announced Wednesday.
- Giant Delivers has removed delivery fees on orders between Tuesday-Thursday, halved the fee to $3.95 for orders Friday-Monday and halved the minimum order requirement from $60 to $30. Giant Pickup, meanwhile, no longer requires a $30 minimum order at 155 stores for any day of the week, but has kept its pickup fee of $2.95.
- The altered pickup and delivery costs indicate Giant Food wants to entice shoppers to use its e-commerce services and spread orders out across the week.
Dive Insight:
With the new savings for shoppers on online orders, Giant Food is looking to drive the use of its own services, which are fulfilled by the grocer’s workers. It also appears to be trying to rebalance order volumes across the week to better utilize labor and accommodate more customers.
Along with the changes to the fees and order minimums, the grocer is running a promotion for new and existing customers that gives them a free rotisserie chicken — or ready-to-eat pizzas as a meatless substitute — with a Giant Delivers or Pickup order of $30 or more. The offer can be redeemed up to twice a month through the end of the year.
Giant Food, which has also partnered with Instacart on delivery, has often turned to marketing and promotions in order to push shoppers toward its own e-commerce sites and services.
The grocer rebranded its delivery platform, previously known as Peapod by Giant, to Giant Delivers in 2019. Last September, Giant Food expanded its partnership with Washington D.C.’s Union Kitchen, a food and beverage accelerator, to sell more locally produced products through Giant Delivers. In June, the grocer started offering produce boxes for the summer in partnership with more than 20 farms in Maryland, Virginia and Delaware through Giant Delivers.
Grocery delivery and pickup sales plateaued to $5.3 billion from May to July, down from the $7 billion highs reached earlier during the pandemic, according to reports from Brick Meets Click and Mercatus. Those sales bumped up again last month, reaching $6.6 billion. But e-commerce profitability remains a top priority for grocers as consumers have gotten more confident shopping inside stores again.
Giant Food said it is looking to make delivery and pickup "more affordable and accessible" as the grocery industry looks to address food insecurity.
"We are at the forefront of this growing space and believe lower delivery fees and order minimums will make these convenient services even more accessible to consumers," Gregg Dorazio, director of e-commerce for Giant Food, said in the announcement.
