Instacart exploring innovative robotic 'warehouse on wheels'
• Instacart is exploring rapid grocery delivery, according to a leaked document obtained by Insider.
• The startup Tortoise says sidewalk robots used as "mini-warehouses" can save on real-estate costs.
• Tortoise's so-called floating warehouses on wheels can travel at about 4 mph.
Instacart is exploring rapid-grocery-delivery solutions as its grocery partners lose market share to ultrafast-delivery startups like Gopuff. According to a leaked internal document obtained by Insider, one option under review is deploying a fleet of remote-controlled sidewalk robots by partnering with Tortoise, a last-mile delivery startup, and WorkWhile, a labor-tech platform.
Tortoise's floating "mini-warehouses on wheels" can travel at about 4 mph along sidewalks, road shoulders, and bike lanes and carry up to 250 pounds of goods, or roughly 100 food and beverage items, according to a proposal viewed by Insider. WorkWhile couriers deliver from the robot to the customer's home.
In the proposal, the startups said its remote-controlled warehouses would result in about 40% of orders delivered twice as fast because couriers wouldn't have to return to a local dark store to fulfill orders. The Tortoise model, the proposal said, would allow Instacart "unparalleled flexibility in activating neighborhoods without requiring massive real-estate investment."
"WorkWhile and Tortoise are combining their unique offerings to be Instacart's reliable, cost-effective, and easily scalable partners for RGD," the proposal said, referring to rapid grocery delivery. "This transformational new deployment model for RGD allows for unparalleled flexibility in activating neighborhoods without requiring massive real-estate investment (e.g. a dark store on every corner)."
Tortoise floating warehouses travel along sidewalks and stick close to home. Insider/Screengrab
Speed Matters
A spokesperson for Instacart told Insider that "speed matters" for consumers and the company was "constantly exploring even faster delivery options" to empower its retail partners. Instacart introduced 30-minute priority delivery earlier this year.
"Any model we consider will always be in deep partnership with grocers," the company said. "We have absolutely no plans to work with or partner with any online quick-commerce players because, unlike other companies entering the grocery and convenience space, we're focused on empowering — never competing with — retailers."
Instacart's review of fast delivery options comes as rapid-delivery and ultrafast players like Gopuff, Jokr, and Buyk spread across the US and Europe. Most sell and deliver grocery and convenience-store goods directly to customers in about 15 mins and bypass traditional grocery stores. Even DoorDash is jumping into the space, offering 10- to 15-minute grocery deliveries from their DashMarts in New York City.
These rapid-delivery players all use dark stores, or warehouses, to stock groceries. But Tortoise's model calls for a ring of floating remote-controlled robots that roam about 1.5 miles from the main supply warehouse. Deploying multiple floating warehouses in a specific neighborhood would allow couriers to make more deliveries per hour and save Instacart from investing in dark-store leases, the proposal said.
This is how Instacart might use WorkWhile for scheduling couriers. Insider/Screengrab
Ready to scale
In the joint proposal, the labor platform WorkWhile and Tortoise suggested Instacart could cut labor costs by 35% using Tortoise's warehouses and WorkWhile's digital marketplace to fill courier shifts.
WorkWhile screens hourly workers and matches them with employers. In the proposal, the company said its fleet of workers were "experienced in courier roles as 50% of our shifts are courier positions."
Businesses like Instacart can save on labor as they post shifts on WorkWhile's platform according to real-time demand. That allows businesses to "scale their staff up or down on-demand," the proposal said.
"WorkWhile has staffed over 40,000 shifts with reliable workers in 8 markets across 4 states. Fill rates are 80 - 95% and average worker rating is 4.8 stars. Instacart can request workers on-demand and/or set weekly schedules," the proposal said.
The proposal explains how an order might work.
Once the order comes in, the courier closest to the roaming Tortoise makes the selections and delivers the order via car or e-bike. Using the WorkWhile app, they can open the robot's container door. Because they don't have to "go all the way back to the store, WorkWhile-staffed couriers can double the hourly productivity and service a much larger radius," the proposal said.
Tortoise and WorkWhile say they can quickly scale.
"Tortoise is manufacturing a production order of 100 robots and will be placing a Q1 order for 500 robots, which should more than cover any 2022 expansion needs," the proposal said.
WorkWhile said it had a labor pool of workers that were "ready to go" in San Francisco; Los Angeles; Orange County, California; San Diego; Dallas; Austin, Texas; Seattle; Atlanta; and Athens, Georgia.
The monthly cost to run a fulfillment center with gig workers delivering an average of 1,750 orders a week under the hybrid WorkWhile and Tortoise business model would cost $61,393, the proposal said.
