Will Surf for Food

Purely for investigation, of course, two PC World editors turned to the Web for food. One ducked a hated trip to the store for virtual grocery shopping on Webvan; the other tested the site's culinary skill by ordering a gourmet meal for a weekly supper group with discriminating tastes. Here are their reports.

Webvan rocks. That's a professional opinion, from a Web journalist, e-commerce junkie, and avowed grocery store despiser.

Webvan trucks started meandering through suburbia in the San Francisco Bay Area in June 1999. Its premise is promising: Order groceries and other good stuff over the Web, and Webvan delivers it to your door within a 30-minute delivery time that you select. Deliveries are free if your order totals more than $50; otherwise it's $4.95. And no tipping is allowed.

Webvan also offers a break for the chef; alternatively, you can order entire meals from the site with similar delivery.

Though the service is available only in the San Francisco area now, Webvan plans to launch delivery next in Atlanta, Chicago, and Seattle.

His Digital Grocery Excursion

I registered for service, then picked a delivery date and time. Webvan offers half-hour delivery slots from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. I shopped on a Sunday morning and the day's slots were filled, so I chose delivery between 8 and 8:30 p.m. Monday. (Subsequent visits prove it's difficult to arrange a same-day delivery.)

The Web site is easy to navigate. Tabs along the top take you to all the major categories--Home, Shopping, Help, and so on. I spent most of my time in the Shopping area, where the product categories break down into hierarchical lists. Top-level categories include Prepared Foods, Bakery, Produce, The Dairy Case, and Drugstore. It's easy to browse and to search for a specific product.

The site has an impressive inventory, and price comparisons show that Webvan prices are within a few cents of major-label items at a grocery store.

Overall, buying groceries online is a pleasant experience, especially on a broadband connection. My first visit took close to an hour to work through all the digital aisles. But you can save your shopping list, so future visits go much faster.

A few drawbacks: the inability to squeeze your own melons and other produce, no mechanism for using newspaper coupons, and no free samples. Also, Webvan doesn't provide nutritional labels for some products, which could be a problem for some people.

Plenty of Time

Such drawbacks are minor to me. I finished shopping, plugged in credit card information, and sent my order. I returned a few hours later and successfully added a few forgotten items to the order. (Webvan generally lets you add or remove stuff until 9:30 p.m. the day before delivery.)

At 8:27 p.m. Monday, Webvan delivered. The food arrived in bins separated by temperatures (chilled, frozen, and ambient). The driver was polite and carried in the groceries. She helped me remove everything so she could take the bins (otherwise, there's a $3 deposit per bin).

The first thing I noticed about my order was the produce. I ordered a combination of organic and regular stuff, and it all looked great. Everything else was pretty much exactly what I expected.