CINCINNATI, Oct. 12, 2021
/PRNewswire/ -- The Kroger Co. (NYSE: KR), America's largest
grocery retailer, today announced it will offer more
customers Kroger Delivery through the addition of new Kroger
fulfillment centers powered by the Ocado Group, combining vertical
integration, machine learning, and robotics to provide an
affordable, friendly, and fast fresh food delivery service.
"Kroger Delivery is a thriving part of our dynamic ecosystem and
is transforming grocery e-commerce and meeting a range of customer
needs through the introduction of first-of-its-kind technology in
the U.S. developed by Ocado," said Rodney
McMullen, Kroger's chairman and CEO. "Kroger's growing
seamless ecosystem continues to scale, and we're committed to
doubling both our digital sales and profitability rate by the end
of 2023 and Kroger Delivery will help us reach this target.
"We feel great about the momentum we're experiencing with Kroger
Delivery and our partnership with Ocado and are strategically
leveraging our assets to expand our operations in existing regions
as well as enter new geographies on the East Coast that leverage
facilities across a growing range of sizes," continued
McMullen.
The organization will share more insights about its plans for
the Northeast, California, and
Florida, including customer
coverage areas, job creation, facility sizes and timing, in the
coming months but today is highlighting the following.
Northeast
Kroger will enter the Northeast for the
first time, offering Kroger Delivery enabled by a customer
fulfillment center (CFC). The facility will meet the need for
same-day and next-day grocery delivery demand.
California
Kroger
will expand its existing operations and boost capacity in
California with the addition of
two CFCs. The medium and smaller-sized facilities will meet the
need for same-day and next-day grocery delivery demand.
Florida
Kroger Delivery launched in Central
Florida earlier this year, and the operation has ramped up
faster than expected, unlocking additional ways of executing and
operating and resulting in high customer repeat rates and net
promoter scores.
To continue driving momentum, Kroger will enter South Florida and introduce two smaller-sized
fulfillment facilities. These will join the already live CFC in
Groveland as well as "spoke" sites
in Jacksonville and Tampa. It will also mark the introduction of
two automated local fulfillment centers with Ocado, enabling Kroger
Delivery to serve customers as fast as 30 minutes with a selection
of 10,000 fresh food items and essentials, and to deliver same-day
and next-day orders with 35,000 items.
"The acceleration of Kroger Delivery continues with these new
facilities and our continued focus on creating career opportunities
and serving customers through interconnected, automated and
innovative fulfillment models that cater to different and accretive
grocery shopper missions in both new and existing geographies,"
said Gabriel Arreaga, Kroger's
senior vice president and chief supply chain officer. "We have a
pipeline of sites in development across the U.S., with several
scheduled to open next year, and we're excited to continue
delivering the Kroger experience to more doorsteps."
"I am delighted that we're bringing Ocado's world-leading
technology to Kroger customers across the U.S.," said Luke Jensen, CEO of Ocado Solutions. "The
Northeast is another new geography for Kroger, and we're excited to
enter it with them. Moreover, with the addition of fulfillment
centers in Southern California,
our partnership is truly revolutionizing the U.S. grocery online
landscape from coast to coast.
"Kroger is also leveraging the full breadth of Ocado's
fulfillment capabilities to meet the growing range of customer
wants and demands. Alongside the current rollout of our automated
facilities and software to optimize fulfillment in stores for
curbside pickup, today's announcement of a further CFC in
Florida and the introduction of
our first 'Zoom' micro fulfillment site in the U.S., serving the
immediacy market, is a testament to the breadth and flexibility of
the offering we are helping to bring to Kroger shoppers. These
fulfillment centers will also benefit from significant upstream
efficiencies, with the existing CFC in Groveland able to act as a major supply hub
into the new Florida sites."
Kroger Delivery currently operates CFCs in Groveland, FL and Monroe, OH and in addition to the newly
announced five facilities, Kroger Delivery is slated to open
previously announced sites in Dallas,
TX; Forest Park, GA
(Atlanta); Frederick, MD; Phoenix, AZ; Pleasant Prairie, WI; Romulus, MI (Detroit); and sites in the South, West and
Pacific Northwest. As the Kroger Delivery network expands, Kroger
will announce new facilities and plans.
Media Assets
To download Kroger Delivery photography
and video, visit here.
About Kroger
At The Kroger Co. (NYSE: KR), we are
Fresh for Everyone™ and dedicated to our Purpose: To Feed the Human
Spirit®. We are, across our family of companies, nearly half a
million associates who serve over 11 million customers daily
through a seamless shopping experience under a variety of banner
names. We are committed to creating #ZeroHungerZeroWaste
communities by 2025. To learn more about us, visit our newsroom and
investor relations site.
About Ocado Group
Ocado Group is a UK based technology
company admitted to trading on the London Stock Exchange (Ticker
OCDO). It provides end-to-end online grocery fulfilment solutions
to some of the world's largest grocery retailers and holds a 50%
share of Ocado Retail Ltd in the UK in a Joint Venture with Marks
& Spencer. Ocado has spent two decades innovating for grocery
online, investing in a wide technology estate that includes
robotics, AI & machine learning, simulation, forecasting, and
edge intelligence.
This press release contains certain statements that constitute
"forward-looking statements" about the future performance of the
company. These statements are based on management's assumptions and
beliefs in light of the information currently available to it. Such
statements are indicated by words or phrases such as "committed,"
"feel," "will," "target," and "continue." Various uncertainties and
other factors could cause actual results to differ materially from
those contained in the forward-looking statements. These include
the specific risk factors identified in "Risk Factors" in our
annual report on Form 10-K for our last fiscal year and any
subsequent filings, as well as the following:
Kroger's ability to achieve sales, earnings, and incremental
FIFO operating profit goals may be affected by: COVID-19 pandemic
related factors, risks and challenges, including among others, the
length of time that the pandemic continues, new variants of the
virus, lack of access to vaccines for certain populations and the
extent of vaccine aversion, as well as the effect of emerging
targeted vaccine mandates and booster vaccines, the potential for
additional future spikes in infection and illness rates including
breakthrough infections among the fully vaccinated, and the
corresponding potential for disruptions in workforce availability
and customer shopping patterns, re-imposed restrictions as a result
of resurgence and the corresponding future easing of restrictions,
and interruptions in domestic and global supply chains or capacity
constraints; the pace of recovery when the pandemic subsides; labor
negotiations or disputes; changes in the unemployment rate;
pressures in the labor market; changes in government-funded benefit
programs; changes in the types and numbers of businesses that
compete with Kroger; pricing and promotional activities of existing
and new competitors, including non-traditional competitors, and the
aggressiveness of that competition; Kroger's response to these
actions; the state of the economy, including interest rates, the
inflationary and deflationary trends in certain commodities;
changes in tariffs; the effect that fuel costs have on consumer
spending; volatility of fuel margins; manufacturing commodity
costs; diesel fuel costs related to Kroger's logistics operations;
trends in consumer spending; the extent to which Kroger's customers
exercise caution in their purchasing in response to economic
conditions; the uncertainty of economic growth or recession;
changes in inflation or deflation in product and operating costs;
stock repurchases; Kroger's ability to retain pharmacy sales from
third party payors; consolidation in the healthcare industry,
including pharmacy benefit managers; Kroger's ability to negotiate
modifications to multi-employer pension plans; natural disasters or
adverse weather conditions; the effect of public health crises or
other significant catastrophic events, including the coronavirus;
the potential costs and risks associated with potential
cyber-attacks or data security breaches; the success of Kroger's
future growth plans; the ability to execute our growth strategy and
value creation model, including continued cost savings, growth of
our alternative profit businesses, and widening and deepening our
strategic moats of fresh, our brands, personalization, and
seamless; and the successful integration of merged companies and
new partnerships. Our ability to achieve these goals may also be
affected by our ability to manage the factors identified above. Our
ability to execute our financial strategy may be affected by our
ability to generate cash flow.
Kroger assumes no obligation to update the information contained
herein unless required by applicable law. Please refer to Kroger's
reports and filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission for
a further discussion of these risks and uncertainties.
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SOURCE The Kroger Co.