California’s largest regional grocer Save Mart has expanded its omnichannel partnership with Instacart to use its Caper Carts AI-powered smart carts and FoodStorm order management system at nearly all 200 Save Mart, FoodMaxx and Lucky locations.

Save Mart will also upgrade to Instacart’s Storefront Pro, bringing ecommerce capabilities with advertising options to its business.

“We’re committed to giving grocers the technology they need to better serve their customers, no matter how they choose to shop,” said Chris Rogers, chief business officer at Instacart. “We’re proud to partner with Save Mart on innovative in-store and online options that enable them to create a truly omnichannel experience that helps their business grow and makes shopping more unified, engaging and personalised for their customers.”

Save Mart has long partnered with Instacart to enhance its omnichannel strategy. Now, with the debut of Caper Carts, FoodStorm and Storefront Pro, the online and in-store shopping experience for customers is further connected. Save Mart first partnered with Instacart in 2019 to launch same-day delivery across its banners, and is now deploying a number of technologies to digitise its stores and serve its customers.

“As a seasoned grocer with deep California roots, we’re committed to delivering fresh, local, and quality products at affordable prices,” said Tamara Pattison, chief digital officer at Save Mart. “Our collaboration with Instacart has significantly expanded our online presence, reinforcing these core values within our local communities. Embracing new revenue streams through Storefront Pro offers us a solid foundation to enhance our business online. By introducing Caper Carts and FoodStorm, we’re allowing customers to access what they love most about shopping online and bringing those elements into our stores. Whether it’s accessing coupons and deals on the carts or easily ordering the farm-to-fork foods they know and love, we’re creating seamless experiences for our customers across online and in-store.”

Caper Carts AI-powered smart shopping trolleys will roll out at select Save Mart and Lucky stores in the coming months, followed by a broader rollout later this year. Caper Carts transform shopping into a personalised experience by featuring an interactive screen that engages customers, tracks spending for budget management, and incorporates a loyalty programme for direct access to coupons, deals and more. For those who are building their shopping list within the Save Mart or Instacart apps, Caper Carts sync seamlessly to the feature and check items off the list as they are dropped into the basket. They also offer an advertising opportunity, allowing brands to connect with customers who spend an average of more than 30 minutes shopping with a Caper Cart directly in the aisles.

The FoodStorm order management system helps streamline retailers’ food service, perimeter offerings and catering operations. It will roll out across Save Mart and Lucky stores. FoodStorm and Caper Cart customers can now place orders for made-to-order items such as fried chicken or custom cakes and pies directly on the Caper Cart screen while they shop, and receive a notification once they are ready for pickup, providing an effortless, in-store ordering experience.

By upgrading to Storefront Pro, all three banners within Save Mart now have access to ecommerce features such as customisable homepage and merchandising layouts, self-serve marketing tools, analytics, dedicated Instacart support team, and support for third-party integrations such as coupons and loyalty programmes. This upgrade also unlocks access to Carrot Ads, allowing Save Mart (shop.savemart.com), FoodMaxx (shop.foodmaxx.com) and Lucky (shop.luckysupermarkets.com) to create their own retail media networks.

California-based Instacart (www.instacart.com) works with grocers and retailers to transform how people shop. The company partners with more than 1500 national, regional and local retail banners to facilitate online shopping, delivery and pickup services from more than 85,000 stores across North America on the Instacart Marketplace.

Save Mart (www.TheSaveMartCompanies.com) is a Kingswood Capital Management portfolio company and a California-based grocer, operating 194 Save Mart, Lucky and FoodMaxx stores in California and western Nevada.

• Members of Retailer Owned Food Distributors & Associates (www.rofda.com), a coalition of wholesale food distributors cooperatively owned by their US independent retail grocer members, representing more than 2250 stores, will leverage Instacart Carrot Ads to power their retail media networks. This partnership enables advertisers to drive sales at thousands of local independent grocers more easily and efficiently.