Sam's Club is looking to expand a test of home and small business deliveries by adding shelf-stable foods and grocery non-foods, according to the Financial Times.
The warehouse club operator is using a parcel service similar to what Amazon.com has done with its primary grocery products service. The online giant has recently begun testing a local delivery service in the Seattle-area that includes fresh, frozen and refrigerated items in addition to non-perishables.
Sam's currently has between 750 and 1,000 items in its home delivery inventory compared to 22,000 offered by Amazon.com. Other services such as Peapod, which include perishables, also offer a greater selection than Sam's.
As would be expected, Sam's has positioned itself as a low price leader even in the home delivery arena. The company's prices are said to average about five percent below Amazon. Amazon boasts that its prices, at least for bulk purchases, are lower than most traditional grocers.
Discussion Questions: What do you make of Sam's testing a grocery home delivery service? Should we expect the same from Wal-Mart? What does this say about the perceived home delivery opportunity in the grocery channel?