I spent my teaching career telling teenagers that "I don't know" is not an acceptable thesis statement, and yet there I was last August, standing in my kitchen at 2 p.m., staring into a refrigerator that contained exactly one lime, a questionable yogurt, and Frank's leftover golf course hot dog wrapped in foil like a tiny silver burrito.
Frank had the car. It was 112 degrees outside. My back had been doing that thing where it pretends to be fine and then stages a coup the moment I reach for anything below knee level.
So I did what any reasonable 72-year-old woman would do. I downloaded three online grocery delivery apps in one afternoon, entered my credit card information into all of them, and then sat on the couch in my bathrobe wondering if I'd just made a terrible mistake. (Ask me how I know that giving three corporations your payment info before you've even seen a price is a red flag.)
Here's my honest review — from someone who was deeply skeptical and is now... cautiously converted.
Getting Started Is More Annoying Than It Should Be
Every single service — Instacart, Walmart, Amazon Fresh, Fry's — requires you to create a full account before you can see what anything costs. Name, email, password, phone number, credit card. All before you know whether a box of Cheerios is $4.29 or $7.99.
Instacart turned out to be the most useful for Scottsdale because it connects to Fry's, Costco, Sprouts, and Safeway through one login. One app, multiple stores. That part I actually liked.
Walmart+ was straightforward enough if you already had a Walmart.com account, which I did because I'd ordered a shower curtain rod online in 2019 and apparently that means they own my data forever.
Amazon Fresh requires Prime membership — $139 a year — which Frank already pays for because he watches that show about the hobbits. So technically that one was "free." Technically.
The Fry's app was the least polished thing I've seen since my student Tyler Henderson's 11th-grade research paper on the Civil War that was actually about the band Civil Wars. But my VIP card transferred automatically, so at least there's that.
Placing Your First Order (Or: The Banana Problem)
Searching for specific items works great. Type "Jif peanut butter" and there it is. But browsing by aisle? Whoever designed that system has never walked through an actual grocery store. The categories make no sense. Is hummus a deli item, a snack, or a "specialty food"? Depends on which app you're using and possibly the phase of the moon.
Here's the thing nobody tells you about online grocery delivery: the substitution settings will ruin your day if you don't change them. The default on most apps is "let the shopper choose a replacement," which sounds reasonable until you get almond butter instead of peanut butter, or fat-free sour cream instead of regular, or — and this really happened — a pineapple instead of a cantaloupe.
Go into your settings immediately and change substitutions to "contact me first." I cannot stress this enough.
You can also write notes on individual items. "Please pick the greenest bananas you can find." "The 2% milk, not the one with the red cap." Shoppers actually read these. I was surprised. Emma told me this was obvious. Emma is 14 and thinks everything is obvious.
One good trick: schedule next-day delivery instead of same-day. It's cheaper, the time windows are better, and honestly, if you've survived 72 years, your groceries can wait until tomorrow.
What Happens When the Groceries Show Up
Instacart sends you real-time text updates as your shopper moves through the store. "Sarah is shopping your order." "Sarah has replaced Thomas' English Muffins with store brand." "Sarah is checking out." It's like getting play-by-play commentary for the world's most mundane sporting event, and I found it oddly comforting.
The produce, though. I need to be honest about the produce.
Your shopper is not you. They don't know that you squeeze avocados a certain way, that you hold tomatoes up to the light, that you'd rather have no strawberries than mediocre strawberries. They grab what's convenient, not what's perfect. This is the fundamental tension of online grocery delivery, and no app has solved it.
But here's what the apps are spectacular for: heavy things. Cases of water. Forty-pound bags of dog food. Paper towels in bulk. Cat litter. All of it, carried from the store to your door by someone whose back has not staged a coup. If you're planning to stay in your home long-term, having a reliable way to get heavy supplies delivered is genuinely useful. Not a luxury. A practical tool.
I tipped Sarah $12 and gave her five stars and felt like I'd just had a small, pleasant interaction with the future.
What You Actually Pay (Brace Yourself)
I tracked a $100 grocery basket across all four services without a membership. The real total — after markups, delivery fees, service fees, and tip — came to roughly $146.
Let that sit for a second.
Now, the memberships change the math considerably, and this is where your retirement budget actually matters:
- Instacart+: $99/year. Free delivery on orders over $10. But service fees still apply, and item prices are often marked up above in-store prices.
- Walmart+: $98/year. Free delivery on $35+. Here's the important part — they charge in-store prices. No markup. This is the best deal if you have a Walmart nearby.
- Amazon Fresh: Requires Prime ($139/year). Free delivery on orders over $25. Prices are competitive but not always cheapest.
- Fry's Boost: $69/year for next-day delivery, $99 for same-day. Uses your VIP card prices and gives you double fuel points.
If you order even twice a month, a membership pays for itself in about three months. If you order once a month, it probably doesn't — unless you're ordering heavy items that would require bribing your neighbor's teenage son to carry anyway.
What Actually Surprised Me
I expected to hate online grocery delivery. I'm a person who enjoys grocery shopping — the wandering, the samples, the quiet satisfaction of finding marked-down meat. I fully expected to write this as a takedown.
Turns out, I was wrong about a few things.
The impulse buying virtually disappeared. In the store, I am powerless against the seasonal Oreos display. On the app, I see my running total in the corner of the screen, and the shame is immediate and mathematical. I saved about $30 per order just by not walking past things.
I can order at midnight. In my pajamas. While watching a documentary about octopuses. (Don't judge me.) The order's ready by morning.
And the heavy items — I keep coming back to this because it genuinely changed things. I have a friend, Carol, who threw out her shoulder carrying a case of La Croix from the car. She's 69. That's not a funny story. That's a Tuesday.
For anyone recovering from surgery, dealing with mobility changes, stuck in bad weather, or just facing a 112-degree Arizona afternoon — even using delivery once a month justifies having the app on your phone. I put it on my list of apps worth downloading and I stand by that.
The Honest Problems
I would not be a retired English teacher if I didn't grade this experience fairly. So here's what still isn't great.
Produce roulette. I've covered this. Your shopper will never pick fruit the way you do. Accept this or drive to the store yourself.
Substitution chaos. If you forget to change your settings, you'll end up with a pantry that looks like someone else's life. Change it to "contact me." I'm repeating this because it matters.
Tipping confusion. The apps suggest 5%, which is insulting. Someone just walked around a store for 45 minutes, loaded groceries into their car, drove to your house, and carried everything to your front door. Tip 15 to 20 percent. This is not negotiable. Frank said 10% was fine and I told him that's the same energy as his 1987 tip at the Olive Garden and he got very quiet.
Minimum order thresholds. Most services require $35 to $50 before they'll deliver. So you can't just order one forgotten onion. Well, you can, but you'll pay $12 for it and then you're just a person who paid $12 for an onion.
The apps change constantly. Buttons move. Features appear and vanish. Instacart redesigned its checkout screen three times in four months. Every time I finally learn where something is, it relocates like a witness protection participant.
Tips If You're Going to Try This
After three months and roughly 14 online grocery delivery orders, here's what I'd tell you:
- Change your substitution setting to "contact me" before your first order. Yes, I've said it three times now. I also told my students to put their names on their papers three thousand times and half of them still forgot.
- Write item notes for any produce. "Firm, not mushy." "Green, not yellow." "The big ones, not the sad little ones."
- Start with pantry staples, not perishables. Canned goods, pasta, cleaning supplies, cereal — things where substitutions don't ruin dinner.
- Tip 15 to 20 percent in the app. Cash is fine too, but the app tip goes directly to your shopper.
- Use scheduled delivery, not rush. It's cheaper and you don't actually need those crackers in 45 minutes.
- Do the membership math. Two or more orders a month means a membership practically pays for itself.
- Keep the store's own app as backup. Fry's VIP prices in the Fry's app aren't always the same as Fry's prices through Instacart. I learned this the expensive way.
The Verdict From a Converted Skeptic
I use online grocery delivery now. Not for everything — I still go to the store for produce I care about, for the marked-down meat section, and frankly, for the excuse to get out of the house on days when Frank is reorganizing the garage for the fourth time this year.
But for heavy items, for brutal summer days, for weeks when my back is staging its recurring insurrection — it's become a real tool in my routine. Not a replacement for the grocery store. A supplement. Like vitamins, or Frank's reading glasses that he keeps in every room of the house.
If you'd told me five years ago that I'd be ordering groceries from my iPad at 11 p.m. while wearing my bathrobe, I would have told you that sounded like a person who'd given up. Turns out, it's actually a person who got smarter about where to spend her energy.
Frank tried it once. Ordered four things. Got charged $14 in fees. Said "I'll just go to the store" and hasn't opened the app since.
He also still uses a paper map when we drive to Flagstaff, so take that as you will.
