Online shopping meets curbside pickup at French E.Leclerc

Earlier this year we wrote about Sears' MyGofer experiment blending online shopping with curbside pickup, and recently one of our spotters alerted us to a like-minded effort that's already well underway across the ocean. At French hypermarket chain E.Leclerc, customers can order online and have their purchases loaded into their car two hours later at no extra charge.

Leclerc's initiative began in late 2007, when it opened its first Express Drive in Roques sur Garonne near Toulouse. With a selection of nearly 3,000 available products, customers then could place their orders online—or via touch terminals in the local Leclerc store or parking lot—and then go to a curbside pickup area to have it loaded into their trunk. Today, many more products are available through the service—including groceries, fresh produce and frozen goods—for curbside loading at more than 20 Leclerc stores. The prices of all products ordered via Express Drive are the same as those in-store; customers simply arrive at their local store two hours after they place and pay for their order online, and it will be loaded into their trunk free of charge. A standard shopping list can even be saved online to speed ordering on subsequent visits.

After years of separation of online and off, it's a sign of maturation that retail is beginning to blur those lines, blending the best of both worlds. The same is happening in consumers' own lives too, of course, so they increasingly expect it everywhere. Any company hoping to win their business had better deliver! ;-)

Website: www.expressdrive.fr
Contact: www.e-leclerc.com/c2k/portail/conso/plus_services/service_conso/plus_services_contact.asp

Spotted by: Florent Lesauvage