Alexa Can Now Shop At Whole Foods

Amazon announced that Echo users can now use the smart speaker to shop at Whole Foods.

According to Venture Beat, Alexa can now add Prime Now order items to a Whole Foods cart, with same-day delivery guaranteed within two hours.

Amazon launched Prime Now deliveries for Whole Foods groceries in Atlanta and San Francisco earlier this year. With this current announcement, Whole Foods deliveries will be available in all 24 U.S. markets served by Prime Now.

Last year, Amazon enabled Alexa voice shopping through Prime Now.

“Bringing Prime Now to Alexa voice shopping combines two of the most innovative shopping technologies available for an experience that our customers are going to wonder how they ever lived without,” said Assaf Ronen, then the vice president of voice shopping at Amazon.

Prime Now orders are placed in a standalone smartphone app. Users can simply say “Add steak to my Whole Foods Cart” and Alexa will record the order. After each exchange, Alexa will confirm what you added to the shopping list, then ask “What else?” until you’re finished.

Alexa can even choose certain items for you based on order history and purchasing behavior of other customers, an Amazon spokesperson told VentureBeat.

Once you’ve finished adding items to a cart, you will then receive an invite to review your order and check out through the Amazon or Prime Now app. To complete an order, say “Alexa, check out.”

To use the service, orders need to be placed by an Amazon Prime member and meet minimum purchase amounts based on location.

As of 2017, Amazon Prime Now was pulling in around 10 million customers per month, who purchase a range of items in four main categories: media (60 percent), electronics less than $50 (47 percent), personal care products (44 percent) and apparel (41 percent). And a further 22 percent order their groceries through Amazon Prime Now.