Lowe's Goes Live on DoorDash & Shipt
VC checkbooks reopen, delivery demographics, ULEZ shake-up
Well, let’s see how much big news we can cram in before we have to sign off for this week’s festivities: we’ve got Lowe’s launching on on Shipt & DoorDash, fundraising updates, some revealing demographics data, plus some good ol’ fashioned policy discourse over in London.
This week’s edition is brought to you by Curbivore — convening Thursday & Friday in Downtown LA!
Today:
Lowe’s Lands Shipt & DoorDash
For Whom the Cash Burns
Chart Time | Delivery Demographics
ULEZ Caught in Political Crossfire
3PD | Lowe’s Adds DoorDash, Shipt as Delivery Partners
Home improvement giant Lowe’s really wants to help get that 20 lb bag of potting soil to your backyard, as it’s announced not one, but two new 3PD partners. Shipt is playing up this announcement as just in time for spring, as the 1,600+ affiliated locations represent the first hardware chain on the platform. DoorDash seems to have nabbed a few more stores, as it claims it’s serving over 1,700 stores nationwide (As of 2/2, Lowe’s had 1,746 stores, about 25% fewer than category leader Home Depot.) While we await more details from DD — (note the 404) — we’d say the $1.99 delivery fee sounds pretty consumer friendly for all the heavy schlepping this helps one avoid.
The Big Picture: Lowe’s is no stranger to quick delivery: it’s offered white labeled same day delivery, powered by OneRail, since early 2022. Around that same time it also partnered with Instacart, where instead of a delivery fee, items appear to have a slight markup compared to physical in-store prices. While it’s one thing to have someone head to Lowe’s to grab you a screwdriver, these specialty retail partners can create a real headache if the 3PDs aren’t smart about dispatching and worker opt-in / filtering. The internet is full of horror stories from IC workers sent to pick up 6,000 pounds of mulch with their 3,000 pound Priuses.
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FINANCE | Who Can & Can’t Raise Cash
With the Nasdaq reaching new highs, investors are starting to open their wallets again to cash-hungry startups — but not everyone’s looking so lucky. Last week we saw Wonder raise a cool $700M, albeit with some big dilution concerns. Now EV upstart Lucid Motors looks to be hauling in an impressive $1 billion, as the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund adds to its 60% ownership stake. Given that Lucid burned through $2.8B in 2023 alone, CEO Peter Rawlinson better hope the forthcoming release of an SUV turns things around, lest he end up a permanent guest of the Riyadh Ritz. Other startups are finding they still can’t raise any cash, no matter how many strings they attach. Nissan reportedly just backed out of injecting rescue funds into Fisker; the latter company’s stock fell to about 9 cents per share, before trading was temporarily suspended.
The Big Picture: But maybe cash-burning startups don’t need VC money; the public markets are looking a lot more attractive after last week’s successful Astera Labs and Reddit IPOs. Grocery cash-back app Ibotta is set to go public under symbol IBTA, that should generate a nice little profit for early backer Walmart. FinTech player Chime is also reportedly mulling a public listing. Others on the will-they-or-won’t-they list that delivery watchers might care about include Shein, Stripe, Turo (🤞,) Zipline, Getir, Northvolt and Klarna.
CHART TIME | DoorDash User Income Stats
DoorDash has released some data on the income distribution of its users, while also highlighting the ways it’s trying to make its service more affordable. Of note is that the majority of its users make between 25 and 99k per year, with the very wealthy underrepresented compared the country as a whole. While weirdos on Twitter keep arguing ad nauseum if getting food delivery makes them a good ally, our hypothesis is that if you look at the compositional effects of this survey, the dearth of high earners is driven by the fact that most delivery app users are younger, which inherently skews towards lower salaries. Compare to their age-adjusted peers, and we’d bet you 10 pizzas that delivery users are as wealthy, or wealthier, than non-users.
Policy | London’s ULEZ Lives, For Now
London’s Ultra Low Emissions Zone (ULEZ) looks to be in trouble. The expanded pollution and congestion cordon went into effect last Summer, bringing down noxious emissions and helping shift urban deliveries to more sustainable modes. But now Tory right-wingers are aiming to undo the law, with both London-area politicos and PM Rishi Sunak looking to overrule Mayor Sadiq Khan and scrap the policy. While the effort appears to have faltered over the weekend, the rabble-rousing has been effective in helping the conservative party pick up seats in local elections.
The Big Picture: It’s amazing, and distressing, how much the discourse has shifted on urban policy, as British right-wingers look to politicize everything. Plans for the ULEZ expansion were originally announced by Boris Johnson, who rose from Mayor the Prime Minister as a transit-supporting conservative. Nowadays not only is the program under attack in London, but across the country the Tories have declared that a made up “war on drivers is over” as they redeploy money earmarked for transit towards expanding highways. Back stateside, NYC’s congestion pricing scheme is also in a bit of legal limbo, with the NAACP’s Staten Island chapter (of course it’s Staten Island) joining a lawsuit attempting to kill the program.
A Few Good Links
Delivery Hero CFO stepping down after a decade. Now it’s Grubhub’s turn to publish some data opposing Seattle’s PayUp laws. Pizza Hut loses U.S. head. 75% of workers report they lack training on flexible work arrangements. FedEx hopes deal with USPS is near. GM ends OnStar data sharing, meaning we’ll all have to subsidize bad drivers’ insurance rates a bit more. WSJ reports CA fast food chains cutting workers as wage increases near, but their case sure would be a bit stronger if it had any actual data / numbers, not just anecdotes. PFT reveals festival-focused food truck variant, doesn’t have the chutzpah to admit they designed it for Juggalos: (“engineered for the bustling party scene in Michigan.”)
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