Walgreens Launching Instacart Delivery
Consumers shopping for same-day delivery of body scrubs, vitamins or breakfast cereal will now have another option in Walgreens.
The drug chain is expanding on-demand delivery with Instacart, the leading online grocery platform in North America, to residents across Illinois, with plans to roll out the service nationwide to nearly 8,000 stores over the coming weeks. Customers can now find tens of thousands of Walgreens favorites, including over-the-counter medications, health and wellness, beauty and personal care, household essentials, and fresh and dry grocery for quick and easy delivery via Instacart in as fast as an hour.
Following the launch in Illinois, the service will expand over the coming weeks to markets including Southeast Florida, Dallas, Atlanta, Washington D.C., New York City and more. Walgreens and Instacart plan to scale the same-day on-demand delivery collaboration nationwide across all 50 states and Washington, D.C., throughout the spring and will also increase the products offered over time.
“Convenience is at the core of what we do and Walgreens is thrilled to be partnering with Instacart to bring customers a simple and trusted same-day delivery option for the products they need right to their door,” said Stefanie Kruse, Vice President, Digital Commerce and Omnichannel at Walgreens. “This collaboration builds upon several other recent steps in our digital transformation to deliver health expertise to customers in new channels, which is timely given shifts in customer needs during the pandemic.”
To order Walgreens items for delivery, customers can visit www.instacart.com/walgreens or select the Walgreens storefront in the Instacart mobile app. No membership is required when using Instacart but the company does offer an Instacart Express membership that includes reduced service fees and unlimited free delivery on all orders over $35.
Deerfield, Illinois-based Walgreens is included in the Retail Pharmacy USA division of Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc. The drug store chain operates more than 9,000 retail locations across the United States, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, serving about 8 million customers daily. Walgreens is No. 4 on The PG 100, Progressive Grocer’s 2020 list of the top food and consumables retailers in North America.
Last week Instacart went on a patent buying spree. The grocery delivery service struck a deal to acquire more than 250 patents from IBM. Financial terms were not disclosed, nor did either company give details about the patents in question. According to ZDNet, IBM in 2020 “received 9,130 patents.”
The deal comes as Instacart prepares to go public, expands its executive ranks and keeps growing, thanks in large part to the rise of grocery e-commerce during the pandemic.
Instacart partners with nearly 600 national, regional and local retailers, including unique brand names, to deliver from more than 45,000 stores across more than 5,500 cities in North America. Instacart’s delivery service is available to over 85% of U.S. households and 70% of Canadian households.
