(Bloomberg)—Two-day shipping is getting passe.
Wal-Mart Stores Inc., No. 3 in the Internet Retailer 2017 Top 500, will soon offer free, same-day delivery of orders in the New York City area, a service already provided by its Jet.com subsidiary, the company’s U.S. e-commerce chief Marc Lore said at an advertising industry event in New York Wednesday.
“In the New York surrounding area, Jet.com right now is offering free, same-day delivery,” Lore said at the conference. “And we’ll be doing the same with Walmart very soon.”
That might be news to the rest of the company, as a Jet customer service representative said there was no such service available when queried by Bloomberg News.
Walmart and Jet have offered free two-day shipping for orders of $35 or more, an attempt to blunt the popularity of Amazon.com Inc.’s two-day guarantee for members of its Prime program.
Rival Target Corp. (No. 20) offers same-day delivery for in-store purchases to parts of New York City for a fee, and will broaden that offering to more cities next year. Earlier this month, electronics retailer Best Buy Co. (No. 10) expanded its same-day delivery from 13 to 27 cities.
About half of shoppers would pay for same-day shipping, but only 29% of retailers currently offer it, according to research from Temando, a shipping and fulfillment software provider.