Ebay Partnering Up With Target, Best Buy & Other Retailers To Test Same-Day Delivery

While you might not be able to get your mitts on that pair of burnished silver cufflinks in the shape of Robert Pattinson’s face* from a seller living in Pocatello, Idaho on the same day you win them on eBay, the company is testing out same-day delivery in cooperation with major retailers like Target, Best Buy, Toys “R” Us, Macys and more.

It seems eBay is trying to put the heat on everyone’s favorite rival, Amazon, with the move toward trying out eBay Now. It’s a mobile app that’s being tested by some eBay members in San Francisco, and boasts delivery in as little as an hour, reports Reuters.

And in addition to helping eBay out, this is a win-win situation for  traditional retailers trying to battle Amazon in the online arena as well.

It’s going to be a heck of a fight, as Amazon is busy building warehouses in cities like New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco to to deliver products to shoppers as fast as possible and prompting some to wonder whether it’s getting ready to really go gangbusters with its same-day delivery. Amazon recently said it that wouldn’t be economical, however.

EBay might have a leg up here, as it won’t need warehouses like Amazon does. It seems like it will work like this: Stores already have their inventories uploaded onto eBay’s online marketplace, so when a shopper selects the desired product, a courier will head to the local retailer to pick it up. Once the courier delivers the item to the shopper, the customer either pays in person with an iPhone credit card swipe device or through their PayPal accounts on eBay.

Walgreens, Crate & Barrel, Nordstrom and Fry’s Electronics are also taking part in the testing.

*To my knowledge, these do not exist and never should.

EBay tests same-day delivery with big retailers [Reuters]

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