On-demand applications are the latest trend these days. People love shopping online, as this not only saves a lot of time but effort too. From buying clothes to food, books, and even groceries, you can now get anything delivered at your doorsteps. And seeing the current scenario, the demand for these readymade app solutions is increasing at a tremendous rate, especially the need for grocery delivery apps. People do not have enough time to stand in those long queues to get what they want, and these grocery delivery apps, have made things a lot simpler. Now with just a few clicks, you can get everything delivered at your doorsteps.
Talking about on-demand grocery delivery apps, they are not just popular among the users, seeing the myriads of benefits it offers, even entrepreneurs are attracted to this business model. However, there are a few questions which each one of them has in their minds. Today, we are here to answer some of the top questions like, “What is the cost to create a fully-functional grocery delivery app? What features should I include in my on-demand grocery app? Which technology stack should I choose for my app development?” and many more. But before jumping onto any section, let us know everything about grocery app development.
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On-Demand Grocery App: Everything Explained
Grocery delivery app development is a huge rage these days. Many businesses are offering grocery delivery services to their customers and are earning a good amount.
Over the past few years, technological solutions have gained a lot of popularity and become the preference for businesses as well as people. There are several apps in this queue that have been quite famous among users such as grocery delivery apps, taxi apps, money-making apps, and others. Here, we are talking about grocery delivery apps.
Let your users ditch the long queue when they go grocery shopping and facilitate them with a well-built, easy-to-use, customer-friendly, and feature-rich grocery delivery application. This app will them a way to escape from the tedious process and will deliver all the required things to their doorstep.
Online grocery shopping app development services are equally useful for businesses as it provides them a large customer base along with enhancing the business revenue and sales. Entrepreneurs are going apps like Instacart, Amazon Fresh, and others. Despite that, the interest of business persons is increasing day-by-day towards the grocery delivery business. Hence, undoubtedly, this lucrative industry will embellish more in upcoming years.
Let us first have a look at some statistics, so that you can have a clear picture of what we are trying to convey here.
As per the PwC report, on-demand mobile apps and websites market, by the year 2025, will reach a significant value of $335billion. Also, as per Statista, online food and alcohol sales are expected to grow by another $35 billion within the next four years to reach $55 billion by 2021. Revenue is expected to show an annual growth rate (CAGR 2020-2024) of 7.5%, resulting in a projected market volume of US$182,327m by 2024.
If we talk about just in the USA, downloading of grocery delivery apps increased in the country, tremendously, in the first quarter of the year. Instacart, one of the most popular grocery delivery apps saw 218 percent of an increase in its download from February 2020 to mid-March 2020. This was due to consumers’ apprehensions about visiting grocery stores during the Coronavirus outbreak.
There are many big companies who are delivering groceries home. Some of the top players in this industry are:
- Instacart
- Bigbasket
- Shipt
- Peapod
- FreshDirect
Now that we have seen the market statistics and the growing demand for on-demand grocery delivery apps, let us look into the various business models, so that you can decide which one to go for.
Read Also: Know About The Development Cost of An iOS App
Grocery App Development: Business Model
Before starting out with your grocery shopping app development, you must first understand the type of market in which you want to invest. Broadly there are four kinds of apps:
- Marketplace
- Aggregators
- Multi-chain Store
- Single Store
Let’s begin with knowing them in detail.
1. Marketplace Apps
This business model is best for entrepreneurs who do not have any prior experience in this field. These are the complete apps having their own menu and even delivery partners to deliver groceries at your doorsteps. Apps like Bigbasket and Grofers are the best example of marketplace apps.
2. Third-party Apps (Aggregators)
These kinds of apps are famous and popular in developed countries where most people prefer buying groceries online. You can hire grocery app developers to get your app developed as a third-party delivery partner. Apps like Instacart and Amazon Pantry are the best example of aggregators as you can list all the nearby grocery stores in your locality and be their delivery partner. This is just like affiliate marketing. The fulfillment of orders will be processed by the stores linked and you will be responsible for delivering the items to the consumers.
3. Multi-store Chains
Big giants like Walmart have multiple stores all over the world. They have their own app for their customers and from order-fulfillment to delivery, everything is overlooked by Walmart itself.
4. Single Stores
Single stores are the ones that deliver groceries in the nearby market. For example, you have your own grocery store in a locality, and for the convenience of your customers, you decide to have your own grocery delivery app developed. Taking orders, delivering them, managing orders, everything is done by the single store owner. This is the best way to start your online grocery services if you already have your physical grocery store.
These were the four business models and based on the demand and market research, you can choose the one that works perfectly for you and your customers. Now, when you are done choosing the business model, it’s time to look at the features, which your grocery delivery app should have.
Read Also: How Much Does It Cost to Develop An Android App?
Monetization Strategies Applied into Grocery Delivery Apps
Behind every grocery store app development, there is a reason that is earning the money and boosts the sale. Do you know how to monetize a grocery delivery app? Various monetization opportunities can provide benefits to your mobile app. Look at below-
Order Commission
Businesses can get their grocery delivery app partnered with the different retailers and stores and can apply commission-based revenue models. All the commissions can’t have fixed prices as some of them will differ according to the exclusivity, brands, and customer reach.
Delivery Charges
Keeping the delivery charge the same for every delivery, businesses can put its percentage as per the distance, total cost, or emergency basis. Grocery delivery apps like Instacart provide the option of monthly and yearly delivery plans to their users with a fixed charge for their limitless deliveries.
In-app Advertising
To bear the grocery delivery app development cost, it is a better option business must go for. Grocery delivery apps can display the ads of other brands in-between the grocery products. These ads can be related to the user’s preferences to improve their experience.
Grocery App Development Features
Based on the business model and the requirements of your customers, your grocery app should have everything to offer a pleasant and convenient shopping experience to them. The main features of on-demand grocery delivery app development are divided into three main sections– each for the user, driver, and admin. Let us discuss these feature sets one after another in detail.
User Panel
User Registration: Your app will have a login and sign up option for your users. You can also integrate social media as this makes the registration process a lot easier.
Profile Creation: This option allows your users to create a profile, update their contact details and payment methods, and manage their profiles. This is important as the details once saved can be used for quick checkouts.
Product Categorization: Your grocery store app should have all the products categorized properly. This facilitates users to easily go to a particular category and choose the product they are looking for.
Search Bar: This option is one of the most used features by users to find a particular product, which they are looking for.
Filter: You must include a filter in your grocery app as this makes sorting all the products a lot more convenient.
Shopping Cart: This way, users can add all the products in their cart and once they are done with their grocery shopping, they can easily check-out.
Multiple Payment Options: Giving more than one payment option is always a good idea. You must integrate various modes of payment for users to be able to pay easily.
e-Wallets: You can also ask mobile app developers to integrate an e-wallet in your app. The built-in wallet makes the check-out process quick and effortless as users can pre-store their money in that wallet.
Real-time Tracking: This is one of the most needed features in almost all on-demand mobile apps. This feature not only keeps the customers informed about their order but is also great for user engagement.
Selection of Time-slot: People love ordering online items so that they can get them at their leisure. Giving an option to your users for selecting the time-slot for delivery is a great idea and a must-have feature so that they can order the items as and when they want.
Order History: For people, who like ordering the same stuff or monthly groceries, this feature comes really handy. Seeing their previous orders, they can easily make their next order in just a few clicks.
Customer Support: This is important as your customers should be able to reach you whenever they face any issue.
Promo Codes: This is one of the best ways to increase user engagement and sales. Users tend to get attracted to discounts and promo codes.
Admin Panel
Dashboard: A dashboard that can track and manage all the activities of a grocery store is very important.
Manage Stores: If you are a multi-chain store business and this feature comes really handy. You can easily manage all the orders for all your stores being at a single place.
User Management: Admin panel would have the right to add or remove users. Owners can coordinate with all the consumers that are tuned to their grocery app.
Add Products: Admin should be able to keep the grocery store updated by adding the new items and removing the ones that has gone out of stock.
Assign Order: To ensure that all orders are executed in a systematic manner this feature is very important. This feature allows admin to assign new orders to the concerned person.
Manage Payments: Admin should be able to access all the payment details related to the orders made. Payments received or refunded can be easily seen here.
Create Codes: Admin should be able to create new offers and promo codes for the users.
Driver Panel
Delivery Requests: Your delivery partners should have an option to either accept or reject the order in case the location of the user is far off.
Delivery Notifications: Whenever they receive any new order, they will get a notification indicating the same with all the order details.
Location Tracking: Drivers will be able to track the order easily to avoid delay while finding the user’s location.
Set Availability: Delivery partners will be able to set their availability for work and only in those working hours they should receive orders for delivery.
Delivery Time Slots: Drivers would be notified with the delivery time-slots selected by the users so that they can deliver the order on time and in the time-slots selected by users.
Work History: In order to avoid any confusion related to work, payment, or performance, drivers would be able to see all their previous work history.
Payments: Drivers would also have a detail of the invoices of their complete earning to avoid any payment related dispute.
Customer Support: Just like your users, your drivers would have the facility of contacting you in case they face any issues delivering the order.
Some Advanced Features
Push Notifications: This is one of the best ways to notify both your users and drivers for upcoming offers and discounts.
GPS Tracking: For all on-demand mobile apps, GPS tracking is a must-have feature. It helps drivers to locate the location of delivery very easily and also help users to track their order’s location.
Loyalty Programs: This is great for both your drivers and users as this will allow them to avail some special offers and services and earn extra in case of drivers.
Behavior Tracking: This is one of the best ways to study user behavior and suggests the products based on their previous visits.
In-app Calling and Chatting: This feature ensures the safety and privacy of data as both drivers and users cannot see each other’s contact details and can contact each other via the app itself.
Reviews and Feedbacks: Both drivers and users should have an option to rate the services offered or share the feedback for improvements in matchmaking.
Now that we have seen a complete list of features, which your grocery app should have, let’s move on to the next part–
Grocery App Development Technology Stack
While the technologies used to create a grocery delivery app may vary, depending upon the mobile app development company you choose, but here are some of the most popular and commonly used ones.
- Push Notifications – Push.io, Twilio
- SMS, Voice, and Phone Verification – Nexmo, Twilio
- Payments – Braintree, PayPal, Stripe, E-Wallets
- Database – MongoDB, Hbase, Mail Chimp Integration, Cassandra, Postgress
- Cloud Environment – AWS, Google, Azure
- Realtime Analytics – Apache Flink, Cisco, IBM, Hadoop, Spark, BigData
Required Team Structure
Grocery delivery app development is a complex process and having the right team of experts on board is the most crucial step of this process. You must do proper market research and discuss your project with a top mobile app development company, before handing over it for development.
Hire an experienced and skilled team of grocery delivery app developers & designers that will provide you a superior app development experience. Keep the team precise and must include only required members in it.
You must ask for the portfolio and previous work experience of the app development company to see the kind of work they have done in the past. Having the right app development team is very important for the success of your grocery app. If possible, ask for the experience and expertise of each team member.
- Project manager
- Requirement analyst
- Android app developers
- iOS app developers
- back-end developers
- UI/UX designers
- QA engineers
How Much Does It Cost to Develop a Grocery Delivery App?
This is the question for which most entrepreneurs, who are looking to invest in this business, have in their minds. Before answering this question, we would like to discuss a few things which will help you get a clearer picture.
While talking about the grocery app development cost, it depends on the type of app and the features which you want to integrate into it. There are various factors involved in determining this cost like:
- App Complexity
- Type of Application (Native or Cross-platform)
- Development Team Size
- Location of App Development
- Hourly Rates
- Third-Party App Integrations
When you take your requirements to a mobile app development company, based on these factors, they will give you a clear idea about the cost involved in your grocery app development project. Depending upon the above-mentioned factors, the cost to develop a grocery delivery app would be around $15,000 to $35,000 for both iOS and Android platforms with core features. And, if you are looking for an outstanding app, with some astounding features, the price may go beyond, depending upon your requirements.
