Letter from the President We use the Internet as a tool for buying a book, balancing a checkbook, making travel arrangements, and investing in stocks. When it comes to grocery shopping, however, most of us still hop in the car and go to the local supermarket. The Internet research firm, Jupiter Communications, claims the average American visits a supermarket 2.2 times a week. Online grocery shopping has unique customer concerns. Shoppers don't want spoiled food, late deliveries, or large surcharges.
Shoppers like to wander around the stores, touching and smelling what they plan to buy.
So the convenience of online grocery shopping will require some changes in customer culture. Webvan presently serves only the Bay area. It depends on an immense and unique computerized shopping machine in a 333,000 square foot warehouse with more than four miles of conveyor belts. After the order is robotically filled and eventually delivered, sometimes a day later, the frozen items are still frozen. Items for purchase are groceries, health and beauty products, gifts, music, and electronics.