Acme Markets started the new online shopping service in the five-county Philadelphia region March 30. Customers place their Internet grocery orders before midnight at Acmemarkets.com, pay with a credit card and choose a 90-minute window between 10 a.m. and 8 p.m. the next day for home or office delivery. The delivery fee is $9.95.
Customers who want to pick-up their order at one of the 56 Acme Markets in the region can place the Internet order by 10 a.m. and pick-up after 5 p.m. for a $4.95 fee, said Walt Rubel, the director of government and community affairs for Acme Markets.
At the Upper Merion store, six fulfillment clerks known as "e-shoppers" have been hired for the new service, said Charlie Hoffman, the Upper Merion store director.
They work from 4 a.m. to noon picking orders, packing them into red, blue and gray plastic totes and getting them ready for the truck delivery.
A total of 147 workers were hired as e-shoppers for the service.
Six drivers provided by Translabor Logistics Management of Doylestown make the deliveries. The Upper Merion market serves an area from Jenkintown and Flourtown to Skippack, Norristown, Upper Merion, Plymouth and Lower Merion.
On Monday, driver Mike Jones had deliveries to make in Oreland, Flourtown, Whitpain and Cheltenham. Jones drives one of the three new, $60,000 Mitsubishi box trucks from the Upper Merion store that has a separate freezer and refrigerator compartment for the grocery orders. Those items are packed separately in the color-coded totes.
The three trucks and five electronic hand scanners were purchased for the Upper Merion store to inaugurate the new service. The trucks showcase photographs of a paper grocery bag on wheels along with the advertising message "You click. We deliver. Easy."
"We're happy with the early (electronic) orders. This store had the second highest volume of orders and dollars," said Michael Gambone, the Upper Merion assistant store director. "The Bustleton Avenue store had the highest numbers."
"Most of the orders in the first week were over $100."
Eighty percent of the orders in the first week of service have been deliveries. The remainder have been pick-up orders.
"We strive to give the customers maximum shelf life," said Hoffman. "For the dairy products it has to be at least five days until expiration."
Albertsons Inc. of Boise, Idaho, the parent company of Acme Markets, operates more than 2,300 stores in 31 states.
The online grocery service was first introduced in Seattle, Wash. in 1999. It has been rolled out since then in California, Portland, Ore., Las Vegas, Nev. and Dallas/Fort Worth, Texas.
In other Acme Markets developments, the Ambler store renovation project will start sometime in late 2004, said Rubel. The renovation project will take 36 weeks while the store remains open.
For information on the online grocery service, go to Acmemarkets.com.
Carl Rotenberg can be reached at crotenberg@timesherald.com or 610-272-2500, ext. 350.