Ordering an item online and picking it up at the local outlet of a chain retailer is a great advance in e-commerce, but it seems more convenient than it is. Even when everything is working smoothly, it doesn’t actually save shoppers any time. The service hasn’t been operating smoothly at many retailers this holiday season, though: is it doomed to end up in the trash bin of business ideas that seemed like a good idea at the time? [More]
site to store
Walmart Testing Online Grocery Ordering And Pickup In Denver
By 1.31.14
Ordering stuff online for in-store pickup is convenient and saves on delivery fees, but would you do it with groceries? Would you do it with groceries at Walmart? That’s what the mega-retailer hopes to find out by testing “Walmart To Go” service in Colorado. They’ve combined their grocery delivery and in-store pickup business models, which just might be the logical coc [More]
Sears Messes Up, I Have To Face Life Without A Light-Up Skiing Santa Pig
By 1.30.14
Mike had a simple desire. He wanted a lighted skiing pig Christmas decoration. He wanted several of them, actually. Sears had them available, so he placed an online order, choosing in-store pickup. Sears e-mailed him that his order was ready, and he happily drove 40 miles to Sears in winter weather to pick it up. If you’ve ever placed an online order with Sears, you know what happened next. [More]
New On eBay: In-Store Pickup, For Toys ‘R’ Us And Best Buy
By 10.29.13
Exciting news from eBay! The site now lets sellers offer in-store pickup or ship-to-store, just like shopping on the sites of national retail chains. That should be no surprise, though: the first sellers to launch the new option are Best Buy and Toy ‘R’ Us. Wait, Best Buy and Toys ‘R’ Us sell on eBay? [More]
Walmart To Test In-Store Lockers For Pick-Up Of Online Orders
By 3.27.13
Since Amazon doesn’t have bricks-and-mortar stores, it has been rolling out a network of lockers at places like 7-Eleven and Staples, allowing customers to pick up their orders from safe, secure locations, instead of having to chase down FedEx, UPS, or the Postal Service. Now comes news that Walmart is getting into the locker game for its own online orders. [More]
How To Get Good Service At A Chronically Understaffed Walmart
By 1.2.13
What should you know when you place an online order that you plan to pick up at your local Walmart store? An insider––an ordinary store employee in an ordinary Walmart––reached out to us to explain to customers what you should know before you click “Site-to-Store,” and other pitfalls. Walmart may employ millions of Americans, but it still tries to run stores with the smallest crew that it get by with.
Let’s hand the floor over to the employee, who we’ll call “Samantha”: [More]
Item Is Right On The Walmart Shelf, But Site-To-Store Will Take A Few Days
By 12.3.12 — Updated: 9.18.14
Retailers generally don’t price-match their own websites. Walmart, Sears, Best Buy, Gap, Home Depot… they’re separate operations. Lee didn’t know that, though, and tried to get Walmart to match its online price for the router he wanted. They refused. That’s not worthy of publication on Consumerist, but what happened next is. He whipped out a smartphone and ordered the router sitting on the shelf in front of him for in-store pickup. Hurray! He beat the system! Until an e-mail from Walmart arrived telling him that he could expect to pick up his new router sometime next week. [More]
Walmart Sends Me Cheaper Bed Frame Than I Ordered, Shrugs
By 10.19.11
Cassandra had a confusing problem with Walmart. She ordered a bed frame to be delivered to her local store. She happened to order a black frame, which was more expensive than the similar (but out of stock) bronze-colored frame. When she got the box home, though, she noticed that new labels had been put over the areas on the box identifying the frame’s color. The labels identified the frame as black. The box itsef identified it as bronze. The frame inside was bronze. So who altered the box, and why? [More]
