Convenience is the name of the game for today’s shoppers. E-commerce seems the easiest solution for those wanting to take the pain out of purchasing, but could it get even easier?
Chicagoland has quickly become a guinea pig for retailers to test out a new-ish kind of convenience: drive-thru shopping. We’ve seen fast food joints do it for the past 35 years, some regional grocery stores have been doing it even longer, and even some liquor stores have followed suit.
Now, mass merchants are experimenting with the possibility of taking the drive-thru to a whole new level.
For example, earlier this year, Sears Holdings announced plans to turn a former Kmart location in Joliet, Ill. into an 85,000-square-foot warehouse store using the company’s MyGofer concept. According to its design, MyGofer gives customers the option of picking up their orders at a drive-thru, and it’s what Sears hopes will save it from financial ruin.
“It’s a big, big opportunity to restructure the company,” Love Goel, chief executive officer of Growth Ventures Group, told the Chicago Tribune earlier this year. “You can get a lot more inventory in the store, and it’s much cheaper to operate because you don’t need as much lighting and staff. It’s a much more productive use of real estate.”
Grocer Meijer Inc. is also developing—and has rolled out—its drive-thru concept with Grocery Express drive-ups at stores in St. Charles and Aurora. The program enables shoppers to purchase groceries and HBC products online and then pick them up without ever leaving their car.
“Grocery Express is another example of the ways in which Meijer is working to accommodate our busy shoppers,” said Rob Fleener, vice president of business development and e-commerce at Meijer. “People can shop online, and three hours later they can pull up to the store and receive their order hand delivered by a Personal Shopper. It’s a great convenience for customers.”
According to an article in the Chicago Tribune, Wal-Mart Stores opened its first drive-thru at a remodeled store in Mount Prospect, building with the idea that mass merchant drive-thrus are set to become even more mainstream than they are today as baby boomers age and the Internet makes a bigger impact on consumer shopping habits.
If the Internet is now the third-most-popular shopping channel like New York-based WSL Strategic Retail reported at the end of 2009, it seems clear that the drive-thru concept will only continue to gain momentum.
Does drive-thru fit into your e-commerce retail strategy?
Reinventing the Drive-Thru
