Top 5 Competitors Of Instacart

Instacart Isn't The Only Game In Town - Discover Five Of The Biggest Competitors Of Instacart You Should Be Aware Of, And Learn How They All Stack Up.

By Actual SimplePublished about a year ago • 6 min read

Instacart is one of the well-known companies for grocery delivery. You can use their mobile app or website to order groceries at your doorstep. Considering the age of online deliveries, many companies similar to Instacart have emerged. And due to this, they are competitors of Instacart. I have compiled a list of the top 5 competitors of Instacart and a brief comparison between them. Let’s check them out!

Brief Overview Of Instacart

Instacart is based out of the United States Of America and is founded by Apoorv Mehta in 2012. The company serves in two countries as of 2023 – the US and Canada. Instacart helps you order groceries from your home using its mobile app or website. When you order any grocery item from Instacart, the order is given to a shopper employee. This employee would go to a nearby grocery shop and purchase all the items, pack them up, and deliver them to your doorstep. The earning model for Instacart is nothing but the delivery fee they charge for your orders. No grocery item is charged against its usual price. However, many retailers may change the price of their grocery items on the Instacart marketplace. But this is very rare and it wouldn’t help retain customers. So, you would mostly find the price of each grocery item usually the same on the Instacart marketplace tool. Hence, the company only earns using delivery fee charges from each customer. The delivery fee is $3.99 for orders of $35 or more and $7.99 under that amount.

Instacart also offers a premium service for regular customers. It is called Instacart+. It lets you subscribe to Instacart’s service through a monthly or yearly fee. As of 2023, the monthly fee is about $9.99, and the annual fee is about $99. This premium membership service waives delivery fees on orders over $35, but customers must still pay the service fee for the shopper.

Top 5 Competitors Of Instacart

1. Shipt

Shipt is a great alternative or a competitor of Instacart. It is based out of Birmingham, Alabama. It offers you the service to order groceries using its mobile application or via its website. The mobile application is available for iOS and android. Shipt focuses on same-day delivery to its customers. Shipt has a partnership with retailers across the country that the shopper would shop from for their orders. As of 2023, the company has more than 300,000 shipt shoppers delivering the customers. These shoppers are not permanent employees of the company. They just deliver on behalf of the company and are self-employed contractors.

Shipt offers a membership for its customers. It will cost around $99/year as of 2023. As a member of Shipt, you can enjoy free food delivery on orders above $35. However, all orders below that come with a $7 delivery charge.

2. Amazon Fresh

Amazon Fresh is a subsidiary of the famous Amazon Inc. It is a grocery retailer with physical stores across some countries. You can use the Amazon ordering app itself to access the Amazon fresh grocery menu. Whatever you order from Amazon Fresh, it is delivered within the same day or the next day. When you order, you can see the delivery timing slots along with the day it would arrive. You can find tons of grocery items categorized along with items from the Amazon storefront.

There is no separate business model for Amazon fresh. You just order like any other item from the Amazon marketplace. Amazon earns from the delivery fee and some price margins on the products you order. Amazon announced that it would start charging delivery fees on Prime orders under $150, beginning February 28, 2023. One important thing to note is that Amazon fresh is not merged with Whole Foods (another Amazon subsidiary) for its operations. It works and is operated independently.

3. Walmart+

Walmart is a well-known brand in the retail sector. Apart from its regular operations, to compete in the grocery delivery industry, it has started Walmart+ (plus). It is a subscription model run by Walmart. You can subscribe to this service wherein you get access to grocery deliveries and products under companies owned by Walmart. With this subscription, you get access to unlimited free deliveries for each order with a minimum price of $35. You get guaranteed delivery on the same day or the next day for all your orders.

As of 2023, a Walmart+ subscription costs around $98 per year or around $13 per month.

Walmart plus is doing great and taking advantage of its already-established name of Walmart. People trust the “Walmart” brand that is helping this service attract customers for their next grocery delivery. Apart from grocery, it includes other benefits on fuels, black Friday sales, and much more.

4. FreshDirect

FreshDirect is another American company that is doing exceptionally well in the retail industry. It offers its customers to order directly from its mobile app or its website. One interesting thing about this company is that it uses just-in-time manufacturing to save time and reduce waste on each order. FreshDirect uses SAP AG software to process thousands of orders placed on its 24 x 7 website every night. Each order is delivered using a reusable bag.

When you order anything from FreshDirect, the order is prepared at our state-of-the-art facility that’s designed to keep food fresh. All the ingredients are directly bought from farms to keep each grocery item fresh for delivery. Once the order is prepared, the order is delivered using refrigerated trucks as per the time slots chosen by you while ordering.

5. GoPuff

GoPuff is headquartered in Philadelphia. You can use its mobile application or its website for grocery delivery items and other food items. Gopuff primarily delivers goods typically found in convenience stores. It would include snacks, drinks, household items, toiletries as well as pet and baby products like diapers. You can even order beer, wine, and spirits that are available for delivery in some markets. To expand the delivery of beer and alcohol, the company launched two services named of goBeer and goBooze.

GoPuff does not pick the items from other retailers. They instead store the items at their own locations for delivery. GoPuff has its own storage locations. These locations store all items listed on their marketplace. Considering the delivery fee, you are charged is as low as $3.95, every time.

Comparison Of The Competitors Of Instacart

All major competitors of Instacart are based out of the United States Of America.
Apart from Amazon Fresh and Walmart+, the other companies are primarily dealing in grocery and food items only. It has been their primary business model.
Instacart does not have physical stores. They only operate as an online service. Whereas Walmart and Amazon Fresh do have physical stores also.
All the companies either charge a delivery fee or a subscription model to manage their expenses.
Although Amazon Fresh has low revenue, it is still growing and the brand “Amazon” is helping it make its mark in the market.
Walmart has been in the retail industry for a long time. The brand is just using online delivery to expand what they have been doing offline for decades. Hence, the revenue is the highest.