If you're wondering just how important speed and on-demand delivery have become, look no further than DoorDash's recent announcement that it plans to acquire Instacart in a US$17 billion deal.
The acquisition brings together DoorDash's extensive delivery network with Instacart's grocery technology and retailer relationships, significantly strengthening its position in grocery and everyday retail. Instacart customers would gain access to more than 50,000 additional stores through DoorDash's network, giving the combined business enormous reach.
Instacart, founded in 2012, specialises in grocery and convenience store delivery in the U.S. and Canada. Its 600,000 “shoppers” - all of which are independent contractors - completed 338 million orders last year. The deal, DoorDash's biggest yet, will give the company greater scale, helping it take on deep-pocketed retailers such as Walmart and Amazon, which have built vast store, warehouse and delivery networks. It's another sign of just how valuable on-demand commerce has become, as platforms compete to capture a greater share of everyday shopping occasions and challenge traditional retailers for the customer relationship.
The race for on-demand is heating up locally
Closer to home, the race for on-demand commerce is gathering momentum, with Uber Eats and DoorDash rapidly expanding beyond food delivery and striking partnerships with some of Australia's biggest retailers.
BIG W recently joined DoorDash, making more than 35,000 products available for delivery in as little as 60 minutes, initially across 156 stores. The move follows Target's partnership with Uber Eats, bringing more than 25,000 products spanning fashion, beauty, homewares and everyday essentials to the platform.
And it's not just the delivery platforms that are seeing insatiable demand, growth and expansion.
Woolworths' latest quarterly results reveal that 48% of online delivery orders are now fulfilled within two hours, up five percentage points year-on-year. The retailer has also expanded its fulfilment capabilities, with 703 stores offering Direct to Boot Now and 776 offering Delivery Now.
What was once considered a convenience proposition for takeaway and last-minute grocery top-ups is rapidly expanding into a much broader range of retail categories.
For retailers, the opportunity is clear: capture more shopping occasions, reach customers in moments of immediate need and leverage their existing store networks as fulfilment hubs.
But there's a fundamental question that needs greater attention: Is the inventory there when the customer wants it?
Speed means nothing without availability
Expanding onto Uber Eats or DoorDash isn't simply a matter of pushing a product catalogue onto another platform and switching on delivery.
It fundamentally changes how retailers and brands need to think about inventory, availability and fulfilment.
When a customer places an order expecting delivery within 30–60 minutes, there is little room for error. A product that appeared available earlier in the day may have already sold through in-store, leaving the retailer unable to fulfil the order or forcing a substitution.
And as retailers expand across their own eCommerce sites, marketplaces and on-demand platforms, maintaining accurate inventory visibility becomes increasingly complex. Every time a product is unavailable when a shopper wants it, retailers and brands risk losing the sale.
This is putting greater pressure on retailers to improve the accuracy and visibility of in-store inventory, which is why we're seeing the likes of Morrisons and Tesco in the UK trial inventory-tracking robots to improve stock levels at the shelf with more immediacy to maximise fulfillment rates for orders.
But brands face a significant challenge of their own - many are still operating with remarkably limited visibility of their online availability.
In conversations with brands, I regularly hear that inventory reporting from retail partners is limited to a daily update. A once-a-day snapshot of what's available online, with little visibility of how stock levels change throughout the day.
While this provides a starting point for understanding broader stock positions, it doesn't tell brands whether their products are available when shoppers want to purchase them. Nor does it provide the real-time insight needed to identify lost sales opportunities, respond to demand spikes or optimise supply chains and logistics to meet the growing demands of on-demand commerce.
And as availability becomes increasingly dependent on a shopper's location and chosen fulfilment method, brands also need greater visibility of stock at a store and channel level.
As on-demand commerce grows, this visibility gap becomes increasingly consequential.
We need to move beyond measuring whether stock is available online to understanding whether it is available in the moment, in the location and through the channel where the customer wants to buy.
So what needs to change?
For retailers, the priority is twofold. Firstly, building the systems and processes that enable accurate, real-time inventory visibility across physical stores and digital channels to support efficient picking, packing and fulfilment, while minimising lost sales from cancellations and substitutions. But equally important is rethinking how they collaborate with suppliers. As demand becomes more immediate and localised, retailers need to share more timely and granular inventory and demand data with brands, enabling both parties to better anticipate demand, optimise replenishment and ensure the right products are available in the right locations when shoppers need them.
For brands, the challenge is gaining greater visibility of online availability at a more granular level. That means pushing for more timely, store-level availability data from retail partners, identifying where out-of-stocks are occurring and building the capability to act on availability gaps before they translate into lost sales. Availability can no longer be treated as a periodic reporting metric - it needs to become an active part of digital shelf management.
Because in a world where customers expect their orders in an hour, yesterday's inventory data simply isn't good enough.
The race for faster delivery is well underway. But the next competitive advantage won't just come from how quickly retailers can deliver - it will come from knowing exactly what they can deliver, when and where it matters most.
💬 So what's been happening in the digital, data & eComm space?
Australia's grocery eCommerce market continues to grow at pace, with both Coles and Woolworths reporting strong double-digit growth in Q1 FY27. Coles reported a 22.9% increase in supermarket eCommerce sales to $1.62 billion, with online penetration reaching 15.7% of total supermarket sales. Woolworths recorded 20.2% growth in eComX sales, with eCommerce penetration climbing to 18.2%.
My take: For brands navigating an increasingly challenging growth environment, eCommerce is simply too big to ignore. With online now accounting for a significant share of grocery sales, understanding real-time availability, optimising for discoverability and delivering compelling digital shelf experiences must be core to the growth playbook — not the poor cousin to traditional in-store execution.
Whilst Woolies eCommerce is flying, Cartology’s performance retail media revenue remained largely flat year-on-year. Sponsored Search and Off Network advertising delivered growth, while In-Store and Publishing channels declined.
My take: Cartology's performance reflects the challenging environment retail media networks are navigating. More networks mean greater choice for brands, while cost pressures continue to squeeze marketing budgets. And while in-store media represents one of the biggest growth opportunities for many networks, convincing brands to invest without robust evidence of value and ROI will make growth harder to come by.
Australians want value, speed and certainty, but free shipping is becoming harder to access, according to Shippit's 2026 State of Shipping Report. The average minimum spend for free shipping has climbed to $135, up from $123 in 2025, with just 8.8% of retailers offering unconditional free shipping. Cost-effective delivery (40%) and faster delivery (34%) are now the top two priorities influencing online shopping choices, with faster delivery increasing in importance year-on-year. Certainty also matters, with 68% valuing accurate delivery dates, while 46% are hesitant or unwilling to shop without free returns.
My take: Retailers are caught in a perfect storm of rising costs, increasing shopper expectations and aggressive marketplace competition. More than ever, delivery needs to be viewed as a key part of the customer loyalty and retention strategy, with retailers building compelling delivery propositions that deliver value and convenience when it matters most.
Shopify has unveiled Shop MCP as part of its Fall '26 Edition, enabling AI agents including ChatGPT and Microsoft Copilot to discover products, build carts and complete purchases via Shop Pay, without shoppers needing to visit a retailer's website. With access to over one billion products, the move marks another significant step towards agentic commerce.
My take: LLM platforms have historically faced a strategic disadvantage to Google and Meta when it comes to access to rich product catalogues and commerce data. Shopify's move is a material step towards closing that gap, expanding both the breadth of products and quality of data available to power AI-driven shopping experiences.
Velocity Frequent Flyer has become the first Australian airline loyalty program to partner with ShopBack, allowing members to convert cashback earned from everyday purchases into Velocity Points at a rate of $1 for 50 points, with no conversion fees. The partnership gives members another way to turn everyday spending into travel rewards, extending the value of cashback beyond traditional savings.
My take: Loyalty is increasingly becoming a currency that extends well beyond traditional loyalty programs and retailer ecosystems. For brands and retailers, the opportunity is to tap into the value consumers place on rewards like frequent flyer points to drive acquisition, influence purchase decisions and encourage repeat spend. As loyalty partnerships continue to evolve, offering shoppers more ways to earn and redeem rewards could become an increasingly important competitive differentiator.
🦊 So who am I?
I’m an advisor, trainer and thought leader with 25+ years’ experience across digital, marketing, loyalty and commerce, working with consumer, FMCG and retail brands. I’m also the host of Unpacking the Digital Shelf – APAC Edition and have been recognised as a RETHINK Retail Top Retail Expert (2026), and Top 20 CMO (2018).
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