In one of the year’s more unusual partnerships, the online retailer Amazon has teamed up with Morrisons in order to begin delivering fresh and frozen food to Amazon customers.
The service will be offered as part of the Amazon Prime Now and Amazon Pantry services and will aim to provide fresh, frozen and non-perishable foods across the UK. The service will be available later this year, so while Prime Now currently delivers products to London, Birmingham, Newcastle, Manchester and Liverpool, there is still plenty of time for expansion before the food hits the metaphorical shelves.
It is said that Prime Now will allow goods to be delivered to your door within one hour for the price of £6.99. Alternatively, the more patient shoppers can use Amazon Pantry who will deliver your items the next day. Morrisons are the first supermarket to sign a deal with Amazon, however, they will continue to offer their own online service which they currently run together with Ocado.
So how will retail giants such as Tesco and Sainsbury’s react to the news? Services such as click-and-collect are already being offered but how will they stand up to Amazon who are purporting to deliver food to your door within an hour? John Ibbotson at Retail Vision commented that “Tesco could soon be about to find out what it’s like to be David rather than Goliath.” This news coupled with already falling sales could spell a big problem for the large supermarket chains.
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