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The country’s first specially designed online supermarket opened in Auckland.
Countdown says the e-store will operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Photo: RNZ
The Countdown e-shop in Penrose will fill up to 7,500 online orders per week from the Auckland region.
It will employ 200 people, including 106 new jobs.
Countdown said the e-store, which will operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week, was planned before the virus blocked.
The company said the new e-Store will significantly alleviate staff pressure at 10 busy central Auckland supermarkets.
Its digital general manager, Sally Copland, said the new e-store has two purposes: to allow people to shop from home and to free stores to cater to customers who prefer to shop in person.
Countdown expects continued growth in its online shopping service once the country comes out of the Covid-19 crisis.
He said that before Covid there was 38 percent growth in online shopping, and that it has now increased by 300 percent.
Copland said the popularity of online shopping is likely to continue after Covid.
“The more people who try an online shopping service and can get what they need and get it from home, now it’s about being able to stay home and stay safe, in the future you will be able to use your time for other things that you would rather be doing and I think Kiwis will continue to adopt the use of an online service.
“Because customers have changed the way they shop, we will continue to see that I believe that the use of our service is truly continuous.”
Copland said he does not believe an increase in online shopping is at the expense of physical supermarkets.
She said that stores have a real purpose.
“Never before than now have we seen our stores as a really important part of our communities.”
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