Please talk to me about online grocery shopping

[Feedingthebirds1]

I've always resisted it. We buy mostly fresh food and I like to choose my own meat, fish, veg and fruit, I look for the milk, cheese, eggs etc with the longest use by date, all the usual stuff.

Due to family circumstances it would make my life a lot easier if I did it online and had it delivered for a few weeks. I'd probably use Morrisons as they have some brands we particularly like that other supermarkets don't.

Please can I have your experiences of any of the supermarket delivery services, not just Morrisons?

I guess ther weivce is only as good as your local depot.
I had never used Morrison's before the pandemic but they were the only ones I could get slots with early on, and they've been so good I've continued using them regularly (not every time- I tend to alternate between shops).
I've had a lot of problems with reliability from Sainsburys (who I always used before) - not turning up when they say they're going to and misplacing whole bags of shopping. Tesco is ok but the flat £5.50 delivery charge is quite steep when at the other supermarkets you can get it for a couple of quid, depending on demand.

I've been doing online grocery shopping for 15 years. Fruit and veg from the farm shop I pass on the way home from work. It suits our very busy lives and I certainly don't have time to cycle to and from the supermarket most days.

@lljkk

I hate the carbon emissions of grocery delivery. Lower if we travel to supermarket ourselves (always on bike). Substitution management is a headache but probably gets easier if you shop regularly & easily know what subs you'd like.

Shopping through Ocado is less though. Rather than having loads of lorries delivering to 100s of stores, and all those stores having lighting, heating, fridges and freezers running. You have a hand full of central warehouses with bigger, more efficient freezers and fridges. The delivery vans used to be bio fuel, but I’m not sure now.

I've tried Morrison's, Asda and Tesco. through the pandemic. Was forbidden to enter a shop by my doctor so had no choice.

Out of all of them Tesco were the most reliable. Tesco do sensible substitutions and you get the option of talking to your 'picker' in a note in each item. So if you want lean bacon you can ask. If you want green bananas you can ask.

Morrison's and Asda don't have this option and you get what you get, often things are missing altogether rather than substituted. It's a bit pot luck. Some of my Morrison's shopping was down by 50% at times. Asda only missed up to 15-20%. But I'd say Tesco rarely missed an item as they substituted well.

But, the Asda online ordering is so much better than Tesco. So it's easy to source things to put into your basket, it's a pleasure to browse the shop. With Tesco I get quite frustrated and end up dumping an older shop into my basket for ease of use when this isn't the most cost effective way.

I'd still say use Tesco. Unless you have an Asda quite close and can pop out and do an express click and collect order. That's another thing they do well. It's a rapid shop slot and you turn up in a few hours to collect as they bring it to your car.

I’ve been with Tesco for years. Going food shopping was taking up half a day, and what’s the point when you can get it delivered and do something else while waiting for it.
You can put a note on every item, so on the ham I ask for pink ham and a long sell by date.
Anything I don’t fancy I send back.

I prefer Asda because as soon as they've picked your shopping they email you including what's missing or has been substituted. Tesco you have to wait til they're delivering or you're collecting to find out. But I tend to do click and collect so that anything missing or dodgy substitutions I can run in the shop before picking up my shopping and pick up alternatives. With tesco click and collect you don't know if anything is missing until you get there so then you have a boot full of shopping, so I the summer especially I don't really want to leave it and go into the shop to find replacements.

Asda also process refunds immediately so then it's just a few days wait for the money whereas tesco takes days to process the refund then you have the additional days waiting for the money. When we tried tesco we thought the experience and products would be better but found both to be worse. Given asda has a crap reputation I was surprised by this.

The asda app is weird at the moment after an update and not showing products properly but is usually very easy to use. I like click and collect as an in between option so I'm not waiting in for the delivery slot.

We have an Asda delivery and I really like it. Only downside is that sometimes dates on fresh produce isn’t very good, but they will give refunds on anything like that so I don’t mind taking a bit of a chance on ordering it! We live close enough to a supermarket (and do a midweek top up shop for milk and bread anyway) that it’s not a disaster if we need a few bits.

Although I work at Morrisons (picking in a store not everywhere has warehouse picking) I actually get my shopping delivered from Tesco. Husband works there so I get my discount. I’ve shopped there for 20 years so find the app very easy to use. I buy the annual delivery pass using my Clubcard points so delivery costs me nothing. Rare to get subs and when I do they are usually pretty good. Plus I know how much my shopping will cost each week as I don’t pay more for subs.

Mine are booked 4 weeks in advance 😊 just go in and amend a couple of days before.

I've used Sainsburys for over a decade. The availability of fresh produce has reduced a little since the pandemic but still good. Substitution are rare - generally if something's out of stock you just can't access it on the app. If the sub is more expensive you get a voucher for the difference, which as we use them every week is as good as cash.

The delivery (one hour slots at half hourly intervals) has always been super-reliable. we have an anytime delivery pass which is £80 for the year, so I book the weekend morning slots. They will take anything back at the doorstep eg if I've ordered the wrong thing by mistake or if an item is too short dated. The delivery folk are invariably pleasant and helpful.

We do a Tesco click and collect, which has been fantastic during lockdown, and we've kept it going for the bulk of our shopping, with a bit of top up in store for any gaps.

Either I or DH collect on the way home from work.

We never do substitutions - instead of Warburtons bread they tried to substitute with ghastly value range blotting paper rubbish, never again.

We reckon any under-deliveries are due to them prioritising the store shelves so there are no gaps there. We just nip in and 9 out of 10 times the missing items are available in our local store. They pick from another big centre about 15 miles from our local Tesco and drive it to our Tesco car park, so we know it's a different stock.

We always get refunds directly to our credit card, never vouchers. Very often if the product is short dated our driver will give us the item and also refund it. We just go home and cook the item Eg salmon or prawns that evening so it's still in date.

Thank you to everyone who's taken the time and trouble to reply, and for the hints and tips too. I'm going to go for it, though I haven't yet quite made up my mind which supermarket to use. It seems like they can all have an off day but mostly it's OK.

It's got to the end of the week and based on the replies it seems like that's not the best time to shop and have a delivery, so thanks to things that have been mentioned here I've formulated a plan. I'm going to do a Morrisons shop via Amazon Prime for milk, bread and some basics to get me into next week and then have a full shop delivery from somewhere for Tuesday/Wednesday.

The line from @heldinadream - It's so worth the odd bit of limp brocolli not to have to trail round the supermarket. - summed up where I am at the moment, so thanks again to everyone.

I bet you take to it like a duck to water OP. I mean, I can 'do the shopping' feet up, wine in hand - and it all turns up - hardly any subs and when they do they're generally ok (and price matched - Tescos). I'm sure the shine'll come off one day but for now - I love it!

The line from @heldinadream - It's so worth the odd bit of limp brocolli not to have to trail round the supermarket. - summed up where I am at the moment, so thanks again to everyone.

I absolutely second this ^ - the time I've saved (plus no commute) esp. over lockdown has given me back hours of my life per week! And my energy reserves. I used to dread the drudgery of traypsing round the aisles having to run everything through the till, packing, unpacking - gosh so much faff. Now its all there in their plastic trays ready for me and DH to take and put away. £1.50 for a C+C is amazing value.

I’ve used Ocado for years and I’ll never go back. I did have a brief flirtation with Waitrose when Ocado got involved in expressing a political position, but it comes from a shop and the stock control just can’t match delivery straight from the warehouse. I’ve only rarely needed a refund and it’s really quick, hardly any subs.

In order of general preference for

Reliability - they turn up when they said they would;

Waitrose
Ocado

Special mention for Amazon, who do turn up unlike Tesco's and Asda

Quality of 'basics'/cheaper price point own brand/likelihood of finding them on the online shop in the first place/the items being picked not being squashed to death, mouldy or otherwise unusable;

Waitrose
Ocado
Sainsbury's. If it turns up, it'll be decent, but a lot of things that are in stock disappear off the order once the picker's been out, so I think it's more likely they're looking at it and saying 'we can't send that out'.

Delivery drivers.

Most are fine, some just hurl stuff at your front door and run away. Unless it's ASDA or Tesco's, who haven't even bothered to carry it that far and have just slung it over the front wall before (and one refused point blank to carry the shopping up to the front door when I lived in a flat - the reason why I was ordering a delivery in the first place - and dumped it outside, five stories down and buzzed up to say 'your shopping's outside', driving off before I'd got halfway down, despite my telling him I had a broken ankle and was on crutches.

Waitrose
Ocado
Sainsbury's
Amazon - will place it over the front wall, but do wait until you've come out and have taken one look at me when I've come out, realised i can't lift it all and started carrying the heavy items to the house.

What could work for you, as you like selecting things yourself for quality, is to put in a large order for the stuff that actually doesn't really vary - frozen stuff, tins, packets, snacks, drinks, cheese, milk, butter, eggs, carrots, onions, potatoes, root or other robust veg, baking ingredients, laundry detergent, cleaning products, etc, etc - and then go to the supermarket just for the things that do really matter, like meat, fish and seafood; you'll spend a fraction of the time in there because you won't need to visit 90% of the aisles. You'd be able to get what you need for a week in two carrier bags or fewer that way - and all done in about 20mins.

I use them all (the 'big'4) and look at all the sites until I find a delivery slot that's suitable.
In order if preference
Tesco - great. Very rare we have a substitute. If we do it is usually good and they give you something more expensive.
Sainsburys- as above.
Morrissons- the friendliest drivers. Quite a few subs on most of our orders. Often things we've had to refuse.
Asda - lots of 'unavailable' products. Rarely send any substitutes at all. Shopping has been one hour late on 2 occasions.
Lettuce on last delivery 4 weeks ago was brown and the easy-peelers were mouldy.