Instacart Offer Deals To Sweeten July Ecommerce Sales

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Huge delivery discounts by retailers including Walmart and Instacart helped boost grocery ecommerce sales in July.

The total U.S. online grocery market ended the month with $7.9 billion in sales, which is a 9.2% increase year over year, according to the latest data from the Brick Meets Click/Mercatus Grocery Shopper Survey.

Delivery sales backed by deals played a major role as Walmart promoted a 50% discount on its Walmart+ membership in mid-July that cut the annual fee to $49 and Instacart ran with an 80% discount on its annual membership.

As a result, delivery sales surged 22% in July. Ship-to-home climbed 6% with pickup holding steady year over year.

Both grocers and mass retailers saw year-over-year increases in monthly active users (MAU) in July. Grocer's base grew twice as fast as last year, up about 7%, and mass retailers posted close to an 8% increase. Delivery MAU expanded by more than 10% versus last year and ship-to-home expanded by almost 4%. The MAU for pickup dropped slightly (less than 2%).

"Intense competition in grocery delivery promotions is eroding regional grocers' control over customer interactions," said Mark Fairhurst, chief growth officer at Mercatus. "While third-party marketplaces may boost short-term order volume gains, they also make it harder for grocery retailers to achieve the economies of scale needed to reduce operating costs."