Asda shuts web shopping warehouses
Supermarket to concentrate on in-store picking model
VNUNET: 7 January 2002
Asda has closed two warehouses in a revamp of its internet home shopping service.
The supermarket shut its two dedicated picking centres in Watford and Croydon on Wednesday, and is transferring the Asda At Home online shopping service to 13 stores in the south east of England.
The new store-based delivery service will mirror that offered by Tesco in which staff pick home-ordered goods from the shelves of a nearby store.
"We've had the two systems running side by side for some time now and the store-based model works best," said an Asda spokeswoman. "With the in-store model we can accelerate our home shopping expansion plans without the set up costs of dedicated picking centres."
Asda spent £4m setting up the two dedicated picking centres in 1999 serving London and the south east. In October 2000 the company also began an in-store picking service to serve other UK regions.
The supermarket said that the new strategy will let it double the number of products available to order in London and the south east from 5,500 to 11,000, and increase the number of households with access to Asda at Home from 8.4 million to 14 million by the end of 2002.
But until the transfer is complete in late March, Asda home shoppers in London and the south east will suffer a reduced service.
The past six months has seen some changes in the grocery home shopping market. Last autumn Safeway wound down its Safeway Collect service that let customers place an order online and collect it from their chosen store.
The service was only a trial in eight Safeway stores but the company decided not to go ahead with a full scale offering because of the cost. "It would have needed more investment in the delivery logistics, which would have taken up resources," a Safeway spokeswoman said a the time.
It has instead opted to concentrate on its core business of High Street stores.
Asda lies third in market share behind rivals Tesco and Sainsbury's. Tesco.com is already profitable but Sainsbury's To Your home delivery service lost £29m in the first fiscal six months to October 2001.
The supermarket shut its two dedicated picking centres in Watford and Croydon on Wednesday, and is transferring the Asda At Home online shopping service to 13 stores in the south east of England.
The new store-based delivery service will mirror that offered by Tesco in which staff pick home-ordered goods from the shelves of a nearby store.
"We've had the two systems running side by side for some time now and the store-based model works best," said an Asda spokeswoman. "With the in-store model we can accelerate our home shopping expansion plans without the set up costs of dedicated picking centres."
Asda spent £4m setting up the two dedicated picking centres in 1999 serving London and the south east. In October 2000 the company also began an in-store picking service to serve other UK regions.
The supermarket said that the new strategy will let it double the number of products available to order in London and the south east from 5,500 to 11,000, and increase the number of households with access to Asda at Home from 8.4 million to 14 million by the end of 2002.
But until the transfer is complete in late March, Asda home shoppers in London and the south east will suffer a reduced service.
The past six months has seen some changes in the grocery home shopping market. Last autumn Safeway wound down its Safeway Collect service that let customers place an order online and collect it from their chosen store.
The service was only a trial in eight Safeway stores but the company decided not to go ahead with a full scale offering because of the cost. "It would have needed more investment in the delivery logistics, which would have taken up resources," a Safeway spokeswoman said a the time.
It has instead opted to concentrate on its core business of High Street stores.
Asda lies third in market share behind rivals Tesco and Sainsbury's. Tesco.com is already profitable but Sainsbury's To Your home delivery service lost £29m in the first fiscal six months to October 2001.