Online grocery delivery helped save my reputation. Taking one child to the supermarket to do our weekly shopping was difficult. With two, the task was impossible, and I started picking fights with the checkout employees. But then our local grocer started offering online delivery, and I was hooked.
More than a decade later, I have a monthly “subscription” to the UK online grocer Ocado and routinely order twice a week. But it isn’t cheap and I periodically suffer through late deliveries and squashed fruit. So the US supermarket chain Kroger caught my eye last week when it announced plans to pilot a self-driving grocery delivery service starting in the early autumn.
Its Silicon Valley partner, Nuro, showed off its vehicle at Kroger’s annual meeting last week. The robo-van looks like a giant plastic box on wheels with two trunk-like delivery compartments that each hold six grocery bags.