Feeding the world grows online

By CHRIS BARTON

Foodtown went on the web last week. Great - more choice in online grocery shopping, I thought. But I was only partially right because foodtown.co.nz is really woolworths.co.nz in disguise. Or, as general manager of online services Richard Harrison puts it, "reskinned".

There is a little more choice because Woolworths and Foodtown's product lines are now largely merged as a result of Progressive Enterprises buying Woolworths for $690 million in June. Harrison says there are 14,500 stock items listed.

So, why are there now two online stores running on the one engine?

"It creates comfort for Foodtown customers to move into the online space," says Harrison, who will not say whether this indicates the Foodtown brand is going to stay and Woolworths disappear as the merger progresses.

Having not shopped at woolworths.co.nz for more than a year, I was interested to see if things were different at foodtown.co.nz. The site is slick and a first-time shop of $200 can be completed in 30 minutes.

That's a big improvement on before when I recall taking about an hour on my first-time shop. Subsequent shops are faster - 15 to 20 minutes - because you reuse your previous list.

With Quick List, you simply type your shopping list and hit enter to begin a search. A list of products is displayed from which users select their preference - making the whole process much more efficient. In my first shop there were only three items the search engine didn't understand.

I'd carelessly typed "catfood" and it preferred "cat food". "Shaving foam" didn't work, but "shaving cream" did. "Shallots" was not recognised, no matter what I did. Harrison tells me the system keeps adding users' strange spellings and descriptions to help the process, but obviously it hadn't come across my idiosyncrasies (or shallots) before.

What's really great about Quick List is that it's there the next time you go back to the site. When you hit search the second time, the results come up with the items you bought last time listed first. So the site learns your preferences each time.

Harrison says since it was introduced a year ago, Quick List has made a big difference to the number of regular shoppers on the site. If they want, shoppers don't have to use a list and can browse "departments" - much like you do with your trolley in the aisles. But, be warned, on the web it's a much slower process.

Another nice idea is the recipe section where you view recipes and get a list of all the ingredients needed.

My only gripe with the site is the "Specials" section. There are so many specials each week that you have to scroll through three or four pages in search of bargains. It would be great if these could be organised by department so you could easily find whether there were any good Chardonnays going cheap. Even better would be an option on your Quick List, such as "always show specials with choices".

Such refinements are considered and sometimes implemented under ongoing site development - something Woolworths knows well. Since 1998 when it started, there have been nine significant "releases" of the site itself and three major changes to hardware. That's the harsh reality of online commerce - learning as you go, rebuilding, and developing new ideas to meet customer needs.

So, after five years, is it making money? Harrison is deliberately vague: "It's meeting its targets."

I suspect that means yes. How many orders per month? Harrison says there are 50,000 registered shoppers, but won't say how many orders go through because he doesn't want to give any information to his competitors. My guess is the site is near to 10,000 orders per month. "You haven't got any competitors," I venture.

While he agrees his major competitor, Foodstuffs, hasn't put any of its chains - New World, Pak'N' Save, Four Square and Write Price - online, Harrison says he faces online competition from other quarters. He's talking about beer and wine etailers such as LiquorKing (www.shopnaked.co.nz), delicatessen stores such as www.zarbo.co.nz, fresh produce stores such as www.organicfresh.co.nz and www.harvest2home.co.nz, and specialist stores such as www.gourmetdirect.com.

I ask what's in the pipeline, but Harrison doesn't want to give too much away in case his competitors beat him to the punch. But he does say most of the new developments come from customer feedback and then trying ideas in focus groups - and we can expect something to do with wine soon.

The next day at the appointed time the refrigerated courier van arrives and the nice courier man brings everything inside in plastic crates and unpacks it all on the kitchen bench. It's all there - beautifully packed and beautifully fresh. With this service and convenience, my local New World is going to be missing my patronage.

* Email Chris Barton

foodtown.co.nz

woolworths.co.nz