Amazon Fresh

Calvin Ling
Jul 25, 2017 · 1 min read

Today, my first-ever delivery of Amazon Fresh arrived. And now, I see why Instacart might be in trouble.

Pricing-wise, Amazon Fresh undercuts Instacart. Plus, Fresh has a lower free-delivery threshold of $40, compared to Instacart’s store-dependent and item-dependent thresholds.

Amazon Fresh also notified me that they were out of stock of the onions I ordered. Instead of swapping in a replacement, as Instacart will do with or without your consent (depending on settings), Amazon Fresh simply refunded the cost of the item and threw in a replacement for free. Amazon has that kind of cash to throw around. It certainly made for a delightful experience.

Instead of limiting to specific stores, Amazon uses a fulfillment model. This means I can have groceries delivered the next morning when I wake up: the order is fulfilled overnight and left on my doorstep in refrigerated containers. The delivery window is 1 hour instead of 2 hours, and the packaging is more like Blue Apron: Amazon Fresh ships in refrigerated containers when appropriate, often using ice packs or dry ice to keep the items cold. Instacart uses human shoppers in regular grocery bags instead.

Having money to spend on acquiring customers makes for a honeymoon-like phase. It’s sure to end in the near-term, but I’ll enjoy it while it lasts.

Calvin Ling

Written by

Stanford MS&E '16. Associate at 415.

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