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Instacart Wants To Hire 300,000 Shoppers To Help Meet Coronavirus Demand

This article is more than 4 years old.

Instacart, which delivers groceries from 25,000 local groceries stores around America  like Aldi, Costco Wholesale and CVS Pharmacy, announced plans to hire 300,000 new full-service independent contractor shoppers nationally in the next three months as it attempts to meet the unprecedented demand brought on by the coronavirus crisis.

  • Instacart’s year-over-year order volume has increased 150% due to growth in the last few weeks, with 15% larger orders on average, according to the company.
  • The platform gives customers the ability to shop at local grocers online by having an Instacart shopper pick everything out and deliver to the customers’ homes with turnarounds often under 24 hours—allowing customers to abide by quarantine and social distancing restrictions—and shop at their neighborhood grocer.
  • Instacart’s largest expansion will be in California, with 54,000 new shopper jobs, followed by New York with 27,000 new shopper jobs.
  • Instacart functions much like Uber but for grocery deliveries, by hiring independent contractors to pick up and deliver groceries for customers and connecting them via its app; the company does not provide salary or medical benefits to its contractors. 
  • The grocery delivery giant said that all employees are now eligible for sick time that accrues and can be used for illness or injury, as well as “up to 14 days” sick time for employees who are diagnosed with COVID-19 or placed in quarantine by a public health authority.
  • “As more people look for immediate, flexible earnings opportunities during this time, we hope that Instacart can be an additional source of income for those looking to earn while also delivering for the communities in which they live,” said Instacart CEO & founder Apoorva Mehta in a Medium note to Instacart shoppers.

Key background: There is unprecedented demand for groceries across America, with popularity of non-perishable goods like dried beans rising 230% and canned tuna rising 142% in the last week (according to Nielsen data), as citizens are being told to stay home and avoid social contact, which has led to mandatory and voluntary closures of restaurants. Services like Instacart are hiring to meet that demand—which potentially puts delivery drivers, warehouse workers and grocery store employees at greater health risk as they navigate public places to allow paying customers to stay home. 

2.25 million could lose their jobs as a result of the coronavirus crisis, according to a Goldman Sachs economist. Last week the The U.S. Department of Labor said there were 70,000 unemployment claims last week bringing the total unemployed to 281,000 people, larger than other week-over-week movement, including the 2008 financial crisis, according to the New York Times. Follow Forbes’ Coronavirus hiring tracker here.

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