Amazon is now adding another perk to its Prime membership: free grocery delivery. The e-commerce giant is now making services from its grocery subsidiaries AmazonFresh and Whole Food Market, which were previously available for a monthly fee of $14.99 on top of the Prime membership, a no-cost additional service. The change was announced in a post on Amazon’s “Day One” blog.
“Prime members love the convenience of free grocery delivery on Amazon, which is why we’ve made Amazon Fresh a free benefit of Prime, saving customers $14.99 per month, ” stated Stephenie Landry, vice president, Amazon Fresh, Prime Now, & Whole Foods Integration.“Grocery delivery is one of the fastest growing businesses at Amazon, and we think this will be one of the most-loved Prime benefits.”
The company also states in the blog post, “Customers are hungry for options that help them solve for both weekly meal planning and the moments when they need groceries in a pinch. Fast and free grocery delivery with Amazon Fresh and Whole Foods Market accomplishes both those needs.”
“In the last few months, we’ve continued to expand grocery delivery from Amazon Fresh and Whole Foods Market to more cities. Today, fresh grocery delivery from Amazon is now available in more than 2,000 cities and towns. We’ll continue to expand our grocery delivery and pickup services to even more cities.”
This is just the latest move in a chess game that is taking place among the nation’s retailers as they try to edge each other out in the e-grocery wars. Back in June, Walmart announced its unlimited grocery delivery service called Delivery Unlimited, which for $98 a year or $12.95 a month, allows customers to skip the per-order fee. This on top of a number of other initiatives that Walmart has already introduced to try and entice online shoppers to its stores, including introducing free, one-day shipping for orders over $35, pickup towers at a number of its stores, and even an in-home delivery service that will allow employees into your house to place groceries directly into your refrigerator. Also in June, Target began offering select same-day delivery for orders placed directly through its website that total more than $35 for a flat fee of $9.99, or for free if they’re already a member of shopping app Shipt (which is a $99 annual fee).