Amazon.com has confirmed plans to roll out a new brand of grocery store that will be distinct from its Whole Foods and Amazon Go chains.
The first of these is to open next year in the Woodland Hills area of Los Angeles, an Amazon representative told CNET. The confirmation follows a report in The Wall Street Journal last month that the online behemoth has signed roughly a dozen leases in the Los Angeles area alone and is also targeting Chicago and Philadelphia. Moreover, Amazon is scouting out spaces in the New York City metropolitan area, in New Jersey and in Connecticut, the newspaper said. Many of the locations under consideration are in shopping centers.
The new store brand will be less highbrow than Whole Foods and will compete with Walmart and other mainstream grocery chains
The Journal report indicated that the new grocery stores will not be constricted by the Whole Foods emphasis on organic and high-end products and will thus be more competitive against Walmart and other mainstream chains. Amazon says the stores will use conventional checkout lanes rather than the cashierless model at Amazon Go.
By Edmund Mander
Director, Editor-In-Chief/SCT
