Online grocer and technology firm Farmstead on Thursday announced that it has partnered with national real estate companies and multiple national last-mile delivery services to create the first end-to-end same-day e-commerce operations solution for grocers.
According to the company, Farmstead’s Grocery OS solution now includes everything a grocer or retailer needs to get a dark-store delivery operation up and running in just two weeks, including:
- Grocery OS APIs for writing and centralizing customer orders into dark stores (and optionally retailers’ existing stores) from retailers’ own apps and third-party marketplaces
- Warehouse space sourced via national real estate giants
- Optional grocery inventory sourcing and stocking for rapid rollout using the Grocery OS product supply network
- Grocery OS software stack for managing online order intake, inventory management with AI prediction engine and automatic procurement, picking and packing, and customer communications
- Optional dark store labor sourced via Grocery OS partners
- Last mile delivery with guaranteed two-hour delivery service across a 50-mile radius, with optional <1-hr delivery
- Optional inclusion on third-party delivery service marketplaces
“Right now, rapid grocery delivery comes with high markups and fees, and Farmstead wants to change that,” said Pradeep Elankumaran, co-founder and CEO of Farmstead. “Grocery OS helps grocers vastly improve efficiency, so they can eliminate fees and make money on e-commerce without passing fees down to customers, and without relying on expensive third-party services. The combination of Grocery OS and dark stores enables faster delivery, a much larger delivery radius and higher profits per order, while customers get lower prices. We’ve been doing this ourselves for several years, and are now offering it to other grocers.”
According to the company, Farmstead’s Grocery OS solution now includes everything a grocer or retailer needs to get a dark-store delivery operation up and running in just two weeks.
Farmstead’s Grocery OS, launched in 2020, was originally a software-only solution. In a pilot with a leading national grocer, Grocery OS was proven to reduce delivery operational costs while accelerating delivery times to under two hours and significantly improving customer satisfaction. Other retailers have since adopted the solution, including most recently Farm Link Hawaii. The Oahu-based online grocer is known for connecting shoppers with the best produce, proteins and packaged goods Hawaii has to offer.
According to Rob Barreca, CEO of Farm Link Hawaii, “By migrating to Grocery OS, Farm Link Hawaii will be able to offer its customers unparalleled convenience of same-day delivery with an even larger product selection from over 150 of Hawaii's finest farmers, ranchers and food makers. With our 20 years of experience in software, product design and farming, Farm Link Hawaii will work closely with the Grocery OS team to ensure the unique logistical and supplier challenges experienced in Hawaii are overcome.”
“While our Grocery OS software greatly simplified grocery delivery for our customers, we saw them still struggling with bringing a unified solution to market,” said Elankumaran. “Our new solution removes those barriers and enables our customers to get their new delivery operations into the market even faster.”
