Instacart beefs up its business delivery service

Grocery delivery platform Instacart announced on Tuesday that it’s sweetening the deal on its new Instacart Business service, offering cash back in the form of credits on large orders and a complimentary Instacart membership for signing up. 

The San Francisco-based company launched Instacart Business in February to cater to companies looking to save time and resources in not having to send employees out to purchase office supplies and other items.

The service allows members to purchase more than 1.5 million products from more than 1,200 retailers, such as Costco, Staples, Restaurant Depot, BJ’s Wholesale Club and Gordon Food Service. Members can create virtual shopping lists to share with members of their office. They can also buy credits that anyone on their team can use to make purchases.  

Instacart is working to build membership in the program with new features, including a 2% credit back on orders of $250 or more, when businesses sign up for a free one-year subscription to Instacart . The Instacart membership provides same-day delivery on orders of $35 or more and free delivery, among other exclusive deals. 

"We know the demands on small businesses—especially offices and restaurants—have never been more acute as they navigate a new world of hybrid office schedules, persistent supply chain issues, labor shortages and much more," said Andrew Nodes, vice president of Business and Supply Chain at Instacart, in a statement. "To help ease that burden, we introduced Instacart Business earlier this year to help small businesses get the items they need while avoiding disruptive last-minute runs to the store. We're now taking it a step further by offering free Instacart to small businesses in the U.S. and Canada—creating more ways for businesses to save time and money so they can focus on serving their customers." 

Instacart said it has already established partnerships with a diverse range of small businesses across the country, such as Connie’s Chicken and Waffles in Baltimore, Maryland, and national coworking company Industrious.  

"I looked at the Instacart app recently and I think it said we have saved some crazy amount of time, like 2,000 hours since we started using it. And I know that every one of those hours is an hour I would have personally spent driving around trying to track down the ingredients or supplies we needed," said Shawn Parker, co-owner of Connie's Chicken and Waffles. "Especially as we started to expand, there was just no way we could be making multiple store runs for multiple locations all day long. Honestly, there's really no way we could have expanded without using Instacart." 

The move is the company’s most recent effort to grow, following a series of setbacks over the last year. The company was expected to go public in 2022, but in October, Instacart CEO Fidji Simo told employees that an IPO was “highly unlikely" because of the volatile market.

The company was valued at about $40 billion at the beginning of last year, but that was slashed repeatedly, dropping to roughly a quarter of pandemic-era highs, according to reports. Reuters news service reported in April that the valuation had jumped back up by an estimated 18%, bringing it to approximately $12 billion.