There was a time when a big box car came to offer the same conveniences as their online competitors, the biggest U.S. grocery chain is now going to start testing the use of driverless cars to deliver groceries in a Phoenix suburb or to the nearest places of the US.
Kroger’s pilot program launched a program in the morning with a robotic vehicle which is going to parked outside one of its own Fry’s supermarkets in Scottsdale. A store clerk loaded the back seat with a bag full grocery. A man was in the driver’s seat and another was in the front passenger seat with a laptop. Both were there to monitor the performance of the car.
With the help of this self driving service shoppers can order same-day or next-day delivery online or on a mobile app for a flat rate of about $6. Just after the order gets placed, a driver less vehicle will deliver the groceries curbside, which will be requiring by the customers to be present to fetch them. The vehicles will going to be opened up with a numeric code.
Currently, Kroger is operating with Toyota Prius vehicles. At the time of next phase of testing in the fall, deliveries will be made by a completely autonomous vehicle with no human aboard.
Cincinnati-based Kroger Co., has partnered with Nuro, which is a Silicon Valley startup which is founded by two engineers who worked on autonomous vehicles at Google around two years ago.
“Our goal is to save people time, while operating safely and learning how we can further improve the experience,” Nuro co-founder Dave Ferguson said in a statement.
The Google autonomous vehicle project which is called by the name as Waymo, which started a similar pilot program last month in Phoenix at Walmart stores. At the time of that case, self-driving vehicles transport customers to and from their selected Walmart location to pick up online grocery orders.
