Save Mart is deploying Starship’s bots from one of its newest stores located in Modesto, just a short drive east of the technology firm’s home base in San Francisco. The store, which opened just under a year ago, serves as an “innovation lab” for Save Mart, the grocer said.
Save Mart noted in the release that it’s the first U.S. grocery chain to partner with Starship, but it’s not the first food retailer to deploy the company’s bots. For the past two years, Starship has offered delivery outside of London, first with Coop and then with Tesco. After the novel coronavirus outbreak hit the U.K., Starship experienced a major upswing in demand and began adding service from several new stores each week, eventually expanding to serve an additional 50,000 households, said Ryan Tuohy, senior vice president of business development with Starship. In the U.S., Starship has focused primarily on restaurant and foodservice delivery on college campuses. However, with many schools now closed, the company has turned its attention to grocery delivery, effectively bumping its deployment timeline in the country ahead by more than a year.
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