Kroger Partners with Nuro to Test Self-Driving Grocery Pilot
SCOTTSDALE, AR - Arizona is officially the land of self-driving cars and the grounds on which Walmart and Kroger have chosen to compete to launch online grocery pilots. A few weeks ago, Walmart announced a new partnership with Waymo to integrate self-driving cars into the grocery delivery experience. This week, Kroger joined the race, announcing its own partnership with Nuro, a maker of driverless delivery vehicles, to test grocery delivery using Nuro’s robots.
“We’re excited to launch our autonomous vehicle delivery pilot with Fry’s in Scottsdale,” said Kroger Chief Digital Officer Yael Cosset. “Kroger wants to bring more customers the convenience of affordable grocery delivery, and our pilot with Nuro will help us test and learn to understand customer acceptance of autonomous vehicles in our seamless offering. We thank Arizona Governor Doug Ducey, Scottsdale Mayor Jim Lane, and the Scottsdale community for being terrific partners and for supporting customer-focused innovation.”
According to a press release, Nuro’s self-driving Toyota Prius fleet will begin same-day and next-day grocery delivery from one of Kroger’s Fry’s Food Stores locations to consumers’ homes today, August 16. While the Prius fleet has seats for humans to ride along in case of an error or emergency, Nuro will also begin testing custom R1 driverless vans that have no seats for humans this fall.
"Arizona is home to some of the most innovative autonomous vehicle testing," said Nuro Co-Founder Dave Ferguson. "We're proud to contribute and turn our vision for local commerce into a real, accessible service that residents of Scottsdale can use immediately. Our goal is to save people time, while operating safely and learning how we can further improve the experience."
While Walmart is shuttling shoppers to and from grocery stores in self-driving cars in the name of grocery delivery, will Kroger beat its competitor to the punch and streamline the process with its driverless, passenger-less vehicles? AndNowUKnow will continue to report as the name of grocery continues to change.
