Walmart Pilots Self-Driving Delivery, Giving Retailers a Glimpse of a New Future

Starting early next year, people in Scottsdale, Az., can place an order from their local Walmart and have it delivered contact-free via one of Cruise’s all-electric self-driving cars.

The program with Cruise, the only self-driving car company to operate an entire fleet of all-electric vehicles, isn’t Walmart’s first foray into self-driving delivery. In Dec. 2019, Walmart announced a Houston-based pilot program to deliver groceries with autonomous vehicle company, Nuro. 

Walmart is not the only retailer experimenting with self-driving vehicles. As the technology becomes mainstream and more retailers adopt it, autonomous cars could reshape brick-and-mortar versus e-commerce dynamics. 

“Look for a surge in such small-package delivery services—particularly from retailers who have the resources to buy a fleet of driverless cars or can sign on with companies that can deploy large fleets for hire—whether that’s Uber, Lyft, UPS or some company not yet in existence,” a NPD report forecast. 

Ultimately, NPD could see a scenario where a driverless car picks up dry cleaning and goes to the store while its owner works. That would create the need for retailers to come up with ways to interact with these vehicles.

The downside for retailers is that if people are ordering goods to be delivered or driverless cars are visiting stores, humans will be less likely to enter brick-and-mortar retail. But retailers could incentive visits by offering deep discounts for in-person visits, using robots’ cars to bring people to stores, or offer a carefully curated experience for consumers. 

NPD also expects interstate commerce companies to be earlier adopters of self-driving trucks. Logistics companies, like DHL, will also play a role in adoption by testing driverless vehicles inside massive warehouses, port facilities and intermodal yards. By doing that, they would be reducing the risk to human life while amassing data about the vehicles’ capabilities.

Beyond vehicles, robots are already making their mark in warehouses. The growth in e-commerce delivery and uncertainty around the supply chain during the pandemic is driving interest in some of these investments. 

“I think that, given the spotlight that the pandemic has put on the fragile nature of our global supply chain, automation and robotics will gain a lot of attention,” Rich Thompson, international director, supply chain and logistics at JLL, told GlobeSt.com in an earlier interview. “And for anyone interested in those investments, it will just accelerate that interest.”