E-commerce solution enables retailers to offer Instacart via its own site

Mercatus, an e-commerce solution provider for North American retailers, introduced a way for retailers to integrate Instacart ordering inside the retailer’s own site.

The Mercatus integration with Instacart Connect solution enables Mercatus-powered grocery retailers to leverage the Instacart fulfillment infrastructure to pick, pack and deliver orders, without giving up control over the customer relationship, something private brands take advantage of online. Through the integrations, shoppers can go directly to their preferred grocer’s e-commerce site to place their orders, instead of going through the Instacart marketplace for the Instacart delivery service.

Mercatus, based in Toronto, works with retailers such as Weis Markets, Save Mart brands, Brookshire’s Grocery brands, WinCo Foods, Smart & Final and more. 

The company has also been partnering with Brick Meets Click on a monthly look at grocery e-commerce sales, most recently identifying a slight dip from June to July.

For Instacart, the company has been making major executive appointments, leaning into former Facebook executives including Carolyn Everson as president and Fidji Simo as CEO.

As more shoppers have taken to Instacart during the pandemic and beyond, Mercatus is integrating the platform to keep shoppers tied to the retailer’s site. The platform works behind the scenes, when an order is placed on the retailer’s site, it gets routed from the retailer-owned site to Instacart, which dispatches an Instacart shopper to pick, pack and hand off (or deliver) the order to the customer. In doing so, Mercatus combines the grocer’s owned commerce channels with the labor flexibility of the Instacart fulfillment workforce — all while giving grocers more control over the shopping experience and, more importantly, the ability to retain the customer relationships they’ve worked so hard to foster, according to Mercatus.

“We know that building digital connections that result in a more-lasting customer loyalty is vital to ensuring grocers have a healthier, more valuable eCommerce proposition,” said Sylvain Perrier, president and CEO, Mercatus. “Grocers that own the customer connections and control more elements when a customer shops online, like assortment, pricing, promotions, upsells, time slots and customer service, are in a much better position to create stronger bonds via a more seamless experience.”

The new fulfillment capability uses Application Programming Interface (API) software to integrate Instacart Connect with the Mercatus grocery e-commerce platform, giving retailers using the Mercatus platform an option to use Instacart Connect to build up a fulfillment program and direct shoppers to the retailer’s own site powered by Mercatus.

The company said for resource-strapped grocers, the integration with Instacart enables them to meet surging demand at peak times without heavy investment in onboarding and expanding their existing in-store team.