What is Instacart? Instacart Review

Basic Introduction

Instacart, founded in 2012 and headquartered in San Francisco, is a startup that helps users purchase daily groceries. Its operating model is similar to that of domestic multi-point delivery. Users select products online and place orders. Generally speaking, the products can be delivered to users within 1-2 hours.

Business Model

Instacart has chosen a lighter business model. The company has no inventory, warehouses or trucks, and only uses software to connect all the links of purchasing goods. On the one hand, this model can greatly reduce costs, but on the other hand, it also highlights the importance of retaining customers - if there is a company with the same model that offers a lower price and the same service, customers will turn around and leave.

Features of Instacart

Serving major regions in the United States, including the San Francisco Bay Area, San Jose, New York, Brooklyn, Washington, Philadelphia, Boston, Chicago, Austin, Seattle and Los Angeles.

With more than 300,000 kinds of groceries from Whole Foods, Safeway, and Costco, customers can place orders from their favorite supermarkets or combine items from different supermarkets into one order.

The crowdsourcing mall model connects the platform with stores that deliver goods.

Instacart’s three customer segments

Buyer:

They use the app to select one or more supermarkets to place their grocery orders.

They can even use their desktop or laptop to place their orders.

Buyers who pay online can tip their buyers in advance at checkout.

Buyers can choose to shop at any accessible supermarket in the area. One order can contain items from different supermarkets.

Buyers can set a specific day or time for their orders.

buyer:

Buyers receive orders via mobile phones.

Buyers are on standby near supermarkets to save time.

They manually pick up the items in the order and deliver them to the consumer.

In addition to their hourly wages, buyers often receive tips from consumers.

shop:

Instacart works closely with major supermarkets in many cities.

These stores are able to increase their sales through online sales brought in by Instacart.

Financing

In February 2018, this company, known as the originator of supermarket O2O, recently completed a US$200 million Series E financing round, led by Coatue Management and Glade Brook Capital Partners.

In April 2018, grocery delivery startup Instacart raised another $150 million in its latest round of financing from old investors such as Coatue Management. This new round of financing is also an extension of the Series E financing that Instacart first disclosed in February this year.

In October 2018, grocery delivery service provider Instacart received $600 million in Series F funding, with a valuation of $7.6 billion. The lead investor in this round of financing was D1 Capital Partners, a new fund led by Daniel Sundheim, the former chief investment officer of Viking Global Investors.

In June 2020, Instacart, a grocery delivery platform headquartered in San Francisco, announced a new round of financing of US$225 million, with a valuation of US$13.7 billion. The round was led by DST Global and General Catalyst, with participation from existing investor D1 Capital Partners.

In October 2020, Instacart, a grocery delivery platform headquartered in San Francisco, announced a new round of financing of US$200 million, with a post-transaction valuation of US$17.7 billion. The round was led by existing investors D1 Capital and Valiant Peregrine Fund.

References

• 1. Instacart raises another $150 million, with a valuation of $4.35 billion: Tencent Technology [cited on 2018-04-05T16:00:00.000Z]