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Retail Tactics: Brooklyn delivery firm aligns with Wal-Mart

October 3, 2017 Associated Press
Wal-Mart is buying delivery company Parcel to help get groceries, other goods to customers in New York City faster. AP Photo/Alan Diaz, File
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Wal-Mart is sharpening its same-day delivery skills through the acquisition of a small, New York City company.

Wal-Mart said Tuesday that Parcel, with a warehouse in Brooklyn, has learned to deftly navigate densely populated areas and get groceries to customers fast. That last leg is key for all retailers in a transformed landscape where the ability to deliver at speed and with low costs brings tremendous advantages in fending off competitors like Amazon.com. In recent weeks, politicians and community leaders like Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams and Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Andrew Hoan, have made pushes to bring Amazon’s proposed headquarters to the borough. Three years ago, Amazon surpassed Wal-Mart as the most valuable retailer in the U.S. and this year it acquired Whole Foods Market, the Brooklyn Eagle reported in a Sept. 14 article.

The announcement comes just a few days after Wal-Mart Stores Inc. introduced higher-end, online groceries that are aimed at younger urbanites. Parcel will deliver fresh and frozen groceries from Wal-Mart and its company, Jet.com, as well as general merchandise. Wal-Mart purchased online retailer Jet for more than $3 billion last year.

Wal-Mart’s focus on fast, local delivery shows how priorities have shifted for major retailers as they travel to shoppers’ homes, rather than the other way around.

Nate Faust, senior vice president of Wal-Mart’s U.S. eCommerce supply chain, said in a company release that Parcel already has partnerships with several meal kit, grocery and e-commerce companies, and has delivered more than 1 million meals in the past two years. Wal-Mart plans to grow that base.

Wal-Mart is not saying how much it paid for Parcel, other than that it was smaller than a number of acquisitions it’s made in the past year. The transaction closed on Friday.

 

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