Best Buy Expanding Availability of Curbside Pickup

Best Buy, Target, Walmart, Curbside, curbside pickup, in-store pickup, omnichannel, omnichannel fulfillment, omnichannel strategy, mobile app, mobile commerce, m-commerceMobile app-driven startup service Curbside, which launched last fall by letting shoppers at 11 Target stores in San Francisco and at a mall in San Jose pick up purchased items at – well, curbside – has expanded to include three Best Buy locations in the area.

“Your response to Curbside has been phenomenal!” said company founder and CEO Jaron Waldman in a blog post. “We’re seeing thousands of Curbside pickups each and every week and the numbers are growing.”

According to Waldman, more than 55% of shoppers using the service have made a repeat purchase, and the company is handling hundreds of orders each day. Growth has continued to be steadily increasing, he said, even after the end of the holiday shopping season.

The Best Buy locations are on Geary Street in San Francisco and Santana Row and Blossom Hill in San Jose, with a fourth location in San Francisco to be announced shortly. Curbside promises to have orders available for pickup in under an hour via the app, which is available in iOS and Android flavors.

A Best Buy spokesman said the company doesn’t have plans to expand the Curbside relationship beyond the Bay area at this point, adding it conducts localized store tests on a regular basis.

Other retailers, notably Sears and Walmart, have been testing out curbside pickup services as another tactic in their omnichannel strategy, as customer convenience and offering more fulfillment options continue to be seen as competitive differentiators.