Friday, May 11, 2012

{the amazingness of technology}

As you might remember, I recently was a resident of the great city of Chicago.  I love Chicago for many reasons, and yes, one of those reasons includes my love for seasons (even the winter).  Art, music, culture and beauty are the heartbeat of the city.  Because of Chicagoans' love for those aspects of life, it is a place to discover all sorts of new technology, forms of art and fashion.

Enter: Peapod's new virtual grocery store.

{photo courtesy Chicago Tribune, article found here}
This is truly amazing to me.  Peapod is a grocery home-delivery service that many Chicagoans use as an alternative to going to the actual grocery store.  You order items online and they are shipped directly to your house.  Peapod has recently taken this one step further by installing a "virtual grocery store" in one of the 'L' stations.  It is literally a huge flat installation of pictures of various products that the "shopper" can purchase.  Using a Peapod mobile app, the "shopper" can simply fill up their "grocery carts" and all the items get delivered to their homes the next day.  


GENIUS!  This is so great.  A hallmark of Chicago culture is residents' use of public transportation.  What better way to help busy residents than to provide a service to them in places they would already be, often with idle time on their hands as they wait for the train to arrive?!  Now, one thing you must know about me is that I am very old-fashioned in many ways. Going to an actual grocery store is a highlight of my week.  But I will also say that when I lived in Chicago, in a place where many people don't have cars (and don't really need to, given the amazing public transit system) and where the winters can be brutal, I had many moments where, carrying armfuls of groceries back in the middle of winter with 6 inches of snow on the ground, I would have LOVED to have my groceries delivered to me.  I had many classmates who used the Peapod service (the old-fashioned Peapod service, that is--the one where you order online).  But how great it would have been for them to be able to also be able to do their ordering while standing in the 'L' station!


Congratulations, Peapod.  You have won my heart.  


I'd love to hear your thoughts on this--is this genius or is it just making the world one step more removed from human interaction?  

P.S.  You can find the Chicago Tribune article about this topic here.

2 comments:

  1. Genius! We briefly enjoyed a home grocery delivery service in DFW in the late 90's (homegrocer.com). At the time I was a stay-at-home mom with a toddler and a baby on the way so I tried the service out a couple of times. It was great. The variety of available products was more limited than local retail outlets but the couple of times I used it were well worth it at the time. Sadly, it didn't survive more than a couple of years in the sprawling DFW metroplex.

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  2. Genius! I've used Alice.com and a couple of local produce delivery services, all of which I loved. It's USUALLY a pricier way to shop (not sure if Peapod is, too), but so incredibly convenient that some people just do it anyway. I would love this if I lived in Chicago or NYC and used public transportation!

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