The Pros and Cons of Instacart
After shopping online for groceries with Instacart and Amazon Fresh for over five years, here are the pros and cons I've discovered along the way.
Seven Pros:
Instacart and many local store delivery services can often beat Amazon for speed and price. I always compare to see which is best. Instacart has higher delivery fees, but you can often buy smaller amounts.
Instacart and local grocery services offer a very convenient grocery shopping experience even beyond your grocery list. Instacart offers a great way to send gifts to people -- flowers and food from the grocery store are much more reasonable than online gift catalogs. What a great way to send someone a small cake, flowers, and fruit.
Now that Instacart has added a "shopping by aisle" feature, it is as easy to navigate as an actual store. The app also remembers what you put in your cart, which makes for an excellent start to your next grocery list.
You can compare prices and nutrition facts, buy in-season items, and just about anything you would buy in an actual store. You get to skip the traffic, parking, and lengthy checkout process. It is also easier to shop for “no salt added” or “low sodium” products this way.
Another great thing about the app is that you can always know how much you spend before you check out! It's very enlightening to scroll down and see how much processed foods like cookies, chips, and sodas cost per serving. And then delete them!
Never forget! You can add items to your cart as you realize you need them. Low on cumin? Add it now so you don’t forget when you are ready to shop and check out.
Compare! You can type in an item and see which store has it available at the best price.
Four Cons:
One downside of Instacart is that the store can be out of items even though you purchased them online. There are settings to help everyone, and you can pick between “substitute” and “refund.” Watch your phone for alerts from shoppers when they start shopping. Some shoppers are perfect about substituting, while others refund whatever they can’t find, but not all of us are black belt shoppers! If I want an item, like fresh tomatoes, I might add a few different types to be sure I get them.
Shopping in a physical store for ideas and inspiration is more fun. Don’t pressure yourself to shop online all the time. To get a real-life experience, I often go to the farmers market on the weekend to meet the growers and see what is local and in season.
You will pay delivery fees, service fees, and a tip, so the overall online delivery service can be up to $10. Still, the savings in budgeting, time, and travel are often worth it to me, and I like supporting our local community and local delivery jobs. Everyone has to make up their mind about time and budget.
Be careful with units! If you think you are ordering three bananas, you might end up with 3 pounds if you ignored the unit or mix up pounds and each! Obviously, if you were in the store, you would not mix this up. But it happens.
How to shop on instacart:
Go to instacart.com and sign up for an account. You can also download their app from your smartphone by searching for instacart in the Apple or Google Android App Store. You will have to enter a credit card or other payment method.
Do a little research to see which local stores are listed on Instacart. Pay attention to how far away the stores are and how much the delivery fee is. Some stores have a minimum amount you have to purchase or they charge an extra fee.
Be patient. Sometimes, you get everything you want so fast, and other times, it may take a while, or the shopper refunds something without substituting.
When you are done shopping keep an eye on your phone because the shoppers will text you with questions. You can also keep adding things to your order even while shopping is going on!
By Judy Doherty, MPS, PCII
All in all, I have saved thousands of hours of time while supporting local businesses and shoppers by using Instacart. So my thumbs are way up for the process! Happy shopping! By Judy Doherty, MPS, PCII
*Instacart is a grocery shopping service available in most areas and has a smartphone app you can download. Once you create an account and log in, you can search for items in local stores. When you add them to your cart and check out, you typically can get them delivered in a day or two.
