Key Highlights:
- Walmart will provide its logistics and delivery services to other businesses as part of a new last-mile delivery service.
- Walmart GoLocal delivery drivers would be reassigned to the company’s Spark delivery service.
- Depending on the size of the package and the area, They will also conduct deliveries by drone or autonomous car.
New last-mile delivery service
Walmart said that it will provide its logistics and delivery services to other businesses as part of new last-mile delivery service. Walmart GoLocal aims to be a white label delivery service for both large and small companies, and another method for Walmart to compete with Amazon.
Although Walmart says the service would be “competitively priced” and that it has “already secured a number of contractual arrangements with national and corporate retail clients,” there are few details about Walmart GoLocal. Walmart’s price will be determined by “the client’s demands and what they want to provide to their customers.” More information is available on the GoLocal website.
A common configuration
Customers will place orders directly with a small business, the small business’s platform will alert Walmart, Walmart GoLocal will deploy a delivery vehicle, and the business will get appropriate feedback. It’s not an uncommon configuration; both Postmates and DoorDash provide white label solutions that work more or less the same.
The driver pool in Walmart’s version is one change. According to Reuters, Walmart GoLocal delivery drivers would be reassigned to the company’s Spark delivery service. Walmart tested Spark as a sort of Uber for grocery delivery — another Walmart partner, Instacart, is a fair analogy — but expanding it up to non-Walmart deliveries (and non-food deliveries) may turn it into a white label Amazon Flex.
Delivery via drone or autonomous cars
Walmart states that, depending on the size of the package and the area, it will also conduct deliveries by drone or autonomous car. Walmart’s investment in DroneUp’s 10,000 FAA-certified pilots, according to DroneDJ, will most likely assist with the drone half of the equation. Another Walmart investment, Cruise’s self-driving electric vehicles, may help facilitate delivery by an autonomous car.
GoLocal, Spark, DroneUp, and the rest are a jumble of brand names and company investments, but they’re more proof of Walmart’s stakes on delivery mastery before Amazon becomes the de facto norm. Walmart’s attempts against internet behemoths like Amazon and Netflix haven’t always paid out — consider the sale of Vudu to Fandango — but with last-mile delivery, it’s at least playing in territory it knows well.
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