Walmart Picks Pittsburgh For In-Home Grocery Delivery Service Pilot Program
NEW YORK (KDKA) -- Three years ago, Walmart announced customers could buy their groceries online, have them gathered and bagged, and then loaded into your car when you dropped by the side entrance.
"Awesome!" declared Deb Martz of Moon at the time.
Martz was one of the first to use this service at the Robinson Walmart, hailing its convenience with young kids.
"Going grocery shopping with a 5-year old can make a 20-minute job be an hour and a half," she told KDKA money editor Jon Delano.
But the convenience could be getting better.
On Friday, Walmart announced Pittsburgh would be among the first cities to launch a new service"delivery right to your refrigerator, as Walmart CEO Doug McMillon told shareholders.
"What if we not only covered the last mile to customers' homes but even the last few steps?" McMillon rhetorically asked shareholders.
"What if we put their groceries away inside their kitchens or garages? A step beyond that, what if they allowed us to keep them replenished, to keep them in stock on the items they use all the time? After all, an empty refrigerator is a problem, especially if you have kids at home."
It works this way:
Customers place an online grocery order; Walmart associates will fill their order and deliver it to your home.
At the time of delivery, associates will use smart entry technology and a wearable camera that will allow customers to control access to their homes and watch the associate enter their home and unload their groceries, even into their refrigerator.
"We're excited to announce that In-Home Delivery will begin this fall, available to one million customers across three cities: Kansas City, Pittsburgh, and Vero Beach, Florida," said McMillon. "We'll learn and then we'll scale from there."
So far, Walmart has not disclosed the cost of this store-to-kitchen delivery.