Five Tips on How to Best Get Your Online Grocery Order

Iselin. According to Allegiance Retail Services, the cooperative arm for Foodtown, D’Agostino, Gristedes, Big Deal, La Bella, Brooklyn Harvest and Pathmark grocery stores, the demand for online grocery services has surged to unprecedented levels due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Homegrown services such as Foodtown on the Go! and D’AG on the Go! as well third-party services such as Instacart are being flooded with consumer orders.

Allegiance’s online grocery sales for its member stores are up 500% over the same prior period last year.

In some instances, because of the online shopping demand, consumers are experiencing some challenges when trying to place their online orders. Allegiance Retail Services offers these tips and strategies when placing an online grocery order to make the process flow more smoothly and provide consumers the best experience.

Plan ahead:

If you want to either pick up or have your order delivered on Monday, do not wait until Sunday to place your order. Try for 5-6 days in advance to ensure availability. Many third-party services are fully booked. Foodtown on the Go! service continues to offer availability, but many time slots are taken days in advance. If you check the websites immediately after midnight, the new day’s availability typically opens up at that point.

Make a List:

Similar to shopping in a store, make a list of the essential items you need. Planning your menus for the week and noting the ingredients you will need will help you build your online order more quickly and easier. Using the search bar also lets customers find items easily.

Take advantage of extra savings:

Review Foodtown digital coupons for extra coupon savings that you can automatically add to your club card account – you just click the load coupon button, and when you purchase the item the savings automatically deduct. Foodtown on the Go! also runs extra promotions exclusively for online orders – there are first time and repeat offers typically available at any given time. Check the website and look for the special promocodes and enter at checkout – savings can be $10 or more off per order. And with Foodtown on the Go!, customers will find the same prices, including all sales and specials, as those found in store.

Be Flexible:

Be willing to allow for substitutions. During these unprecedented times, flexibility with substitutions is the best way to ensure you will get ‘something’. For example, if you have requested a national brand butter in your order, the store may be out of that particular brand, so a willingness to substitute for another brand or store brand butter will ensure you get butter in your order. If you mark no substitutions, and you are unavailable when the shopper tries to reach you, you may receive no butter at all.

Bonus tips:

With reference to substitutions, pay attention to alerts given from the store or your personal shopper as to when they are picking your order. Be ready to respond to questions about your order, via text or phone call. If the shopper can’t contact you, you may not get any substitution and you may miss out.

Try curbside pickup if your store offers it. This will eliminate the need to go into the store to pick up your groceries – many Foodtown locations can deliver your groceries directly to your car.

As to the quality and safety of using store associates to select your groceries, John Derderian, President & COO Allegiance Retail Service explains, “Foodtown on the Go! and Dag on the Go! shoppers are trained shoppers and take great pride and care when selecting the products for a customer. They check for freshness of meats, ripeness in produce and check all code dates, including dairy, to ensure freshness. Like all our associates working in the stores, our personal shoppers wear gloves and protective facial coverings and maintain social distancing guidelines when selecting groceries to fill an online order.”

For more information, visit www.allegianceretailservices.com.