Giant Food opens new Virginia fulfillment center
- Giant Food has opened an e-commerce fulfillment facility.
- The new facility is the second for the Washington, D.C., area grocer.
- The online grocery market in the U.S. had $8 billion in sales in March, down 7.6% from March 2022.
Giant Food, a banner of Ahold Delhaize, has opened a new 82,000-square-foot fulfillment facility in Manassas, Virginia.
According to a May 2 release, the Washington, D.C., area groceropened the Virginia facility to support e-commerce order fulfillment for 140 zip codes in northern Virginia. The facility will enable same-day delivery, which Giant Food said can be fulfilled in approximately three hours, and free midweek delivery, the release said.
The service will be free for deliveries scheduled between Tuesday and Thursday, while it will cost $3.95 per order for deliveries on the weekends, said Gregg Dorazio, e-commerce director at Giant Food, in the release. Orders must meet a $30 minimum to qualify for delivery, according to the release.
"We are continually looking for ways to better serve our communities and our customers,” Dorazio said. “This investment in our newest facility helps us reach even more people with even more convenience.”
Giant Food said its latest batch-picking software and a conveyor-belt system will power the facility, which is its second e-commerce fulfillment center. (It operates another facility in Hanover, Maryland.) Shoppers can place orders on Giant Food’s mobile application or through its website. The facility will create 200 jobs, according to Joe Urban, Giant Food’s vice president of supply chain operations.
The fulfillment center will also offer local options, including from The Perfect Pita and Don’t Forget Cake, the release said. The service will also support beer and wine delivery, including from local brands such as Port City and Solace Brewing.
While the growth of online grocery appears to have started to slow, according to the latest Bricks Meets Clicks survey, following an explosion in popularity fueled by the COVID-19 pandemic, grocers nationwide continue to invest in the channel.
Kroger, the larger supermarket operator in the U.S., has worked to expand its network of e-commerce fulfillment centers, even opening facilities in areas where it doesn’t operate many stores. Kroger in March opened a new 300,000-square-foot facility in Aurora, Colorado, following the opening of a new facility in South Florida earlier this year.
According to Bricks Meets Clicks, the online grocery market in the U.S. had $8 billion in sales in March, down 7.6% compared to the same month last year. Grocery delivery contracted by 7.4%, while pickup orders contracted a larger 8.5%. Ship-to-home fell by 5.9%, according to the survey.