Home Delivery or Click and Collect? Weighing the Pros and Cons
Thomas Mörtl Zimmerer
Account Executive at Anyline
Business owners are incredibly creative people when it comes to finding ways to deliver what customers want when they need it. The grocery industry (as well as other retailers) are at the forefront of the process. Even before the onset of the pandemic, these business owners were working against eCommerce trends, looking for ways to better serve customers who did not want to come in to shop.
Now, their goal is to service customers who cannot leave their homes – not just because they don’t want to do so. That’s where home delivery and click and collect have come into play. Both options are valid in terms of providing a way for customers to keep shopping, but which is best? Let’s take a look at some of the good and bad of both options.
The Benefits and Drawbacks of Offering Home Delivery
Home delivery allows a customer to use, most commonly, an app to place an order. Once the order is gathered, an employee or subcontracted driver picks it up and takes it to the house of the buyer.
For the consumer unable to leave their home, this is the standard option. For the retail business, it means cutting into profits to pay someone to drive the order to the home.
As there are only so many people able to pick the order and then drive it to the individual, the drawback to consumers lies in having to wait much longer for their orders getting fulfilled.
The Benefits and Drawbacks of Click and Collect
In this business model, the consumer places an order, and an employee shops for it and bags it. That’s not different. What is different is the customer comes to the location, pops open their trunk, and the employee places those items in. Consumers love this method because it saves them a significant amount of time waiting for a delivery.
The drawback to the customer is that they have to leave their home. For businesses trying to choose between either method, click and collect meets most goals. It can be hard to manage during peak hours of operation.
It is far more cost-effective to offer the click and collect method than it is to offer home delivery. The biggest drawback to the consumer in this method is the inability to access the order without a vehicle.
Which Method Is Best for Your Operation?
Plenty of factors play a role in this decision, including how much or how little a company can invest in the process. Hiring more employees is often necessary unless technology is used to streamline retail operations to make it more affordable. Looking beyond cost, some companies have chosen to offer both methods, as long as they can remain staffed.
To determine which is right for you, consider the retail & logistics solutions that can help you, including routing and scheduling solutions. Though it may seem far out of reach, the fact is, both options are accessible to even small business owners thanks to technology like this.
