Busy shoppers turning to online grocery services

ROANOKE COUNTY (WSLS 10) - The internet has changed the way we live our everyday lives, especially when it comes to shopping. Many people are choosing online shopping instead of making in-store purchases.

The shopping trend isn't just impacting malls, it's also hitting grocery stores.

Grocery shopping can be hectic.

"I have two children, one's a toddler and one is a baby and we don't make it through the whole store without a tantrum or a diaper change or some kind of catastrophic event," said Katie Fagan.

The Roanoke County mom turned to ClickList, the online shopping service at Kroger. Employees say the idea is to return to the basic approach of buying groceries.

"If you think about the old-time grocery stores in the late 1800s to the early 1900s, a person would bring their shopping list in and give it to a clerk or the person who owned the store and that clerk or individual actually took the product off the shelf, packed it in a bag and the customer went home with it," said George Anderson, E-Commerce Manager for Kroger's Mid-Atlantic Division.

While times have changed, the concept remains simple. Instead of writing your grocery list on paper, customers can now go online

"They place their order, it takes their Kroger card instantly," said Tracy Coffman, ClickList supervisor. "It shows them their favorite and recently purchased."

Once the order is placed, the selection process begins. A trained selector finds the items on the list while paying close attention to meats and produce.

"I have some of the pickiest selectors out there," said Coffman.

Coffman says the order is reviewed for quality before the customer comes to the ClickList drive-through at the scheduled pick up time. So all they have to do is pull up to the ClickList drive-through, In addition to grocery costs, customers pay just under $5 per order. While some enjoy perusing the aisle, others see service like ClickList as a way to take the stress out of grocery shopping.

"It's such a great time savings for us," said Fagan. "I also think of people like the elderly or disabled people getting in and out of their car there are so many different reasons to use it."

Kroger officials said they have about 5,000 ClickList sales transactions per week.