Going Back to Mystery Shopping? Possibly...
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That's great that you found something that works for you! I am happy for you! No, I haven't tried delivery. I have gone full-time into merchandising now and will probably do a very small amount of shopping jobs. It's amazing how the coronavirus has changed my entire life. I used to do a small amount of merchandising and full-time shopping. I never thought I would decide to change but, between all the holidays (and times) shopping slows, it became evident to me to make merchandising my full-time job now.
@Capurato wrote:
I work a full time job/mystery shop and was furloughed for the last few months.
I began delivering groceries via Instacart and found that it is more profitable as a side hustle than mystery shopping. In order to keep full unemployment benefits in my state, I delivered groceries around 10 hours a week and I averaged $42/hr after expenses.
One of our local grocery stores is mystery shopped and I was able to “double dip” IE complete a mystery shop while fulfilling an Instacart order.
Besides restaurants and grocery shops where I am shopping for a batch, I don’t think I will mystery shop as my side gig. Instacart pays quicker, has higher fees and I actually enjoy it more.
Has anyone else picked up delivery as a side gig?
Shopping Arkansas, Louisiana, & Mississippi.
@Capurato wrote:
Has anyone else picked up delivery as a side gig?
Nope, but I am keeping delivery people busy.
@SoCalMama wrote:
@Capurato wrote:
Has anyone else picked up delivery as a side gig?
Nope, but I am keeping delivery people busy.
I have done Instacart for three years now off and on and I hear stories of the new “shoppers”. Like anything it takes a while to get used to and I definitely think all my grocery/Costco mystery shops have helped me navigate stores easily.
Side note - I wonder if people are going to get used to delivery and not go back to shopping for themselves.
I must admit that my original negative impression of third-party delivery services was incorrect.@Capurato wrote:
Side note - I wonder if people are going to get used to delivery and not go back to shopping for themselves.
I have been using Instacart delivery [from Publix] since nearly the beginning of this situation. Only one time did I have an issue, which was rectified to my satisfaction when I called Instacart's toll-free number. Service has been prompt and accurate [with the exception of that one issue]. The monthly fee of $9.99 is well worth it; it negates Publix' per-order fee. The delivery people have always been polite.
Until there is reasonable evidence that a vaccine is readily available, I will very likely continue to use Instacart for the foreseeable future. Even then, the convenience is well worth the price, in my opinion.
@SoCalMama wrote:
@Capurato wrote:
Has anyone else picked up delivery as a side gig?
Nope, but I am keeping delivery people busy.
I’ve read on Reddit stories of customers orders being wrong, stolen etc however I think that’s the exception and not the norm. I’ve had many customers ask if they could personally request me to shop for them (they can’t) and it would be cool if I could.
I’ve made more with tips than from the Instacart fees and even without tips, more than I did mystery shopping.
Anyone see anything wrong with conducting a mystery shop while shopping for an Instacart customer? To me it’s a no brainer and pure profit as long as I do all requirements for both companies.
I have never looked into Instacart shopping but have seen Instacart shoppers in the stores. I am wondering how you would end up netting $42 an hour. Someone on here said the fee was $9.99 per month so if that is the case Instacart could not afford to pay much. And most people I know that order put in pretty big orders which it seems would take a while to find in the store. I read a story about a shopper who said they sometimes had to visit multiple stores to fill the order. How many orders can you fill an hour? Here in my city the stores make the Instacart person do the picking off the shelf. Those tips must be pretty big! Just curious.
I don't think think any delivery service companies were profitable before March. The pandemic changed that... [www.eater.com]
@sandyf wrote:
I have never looked into Instacart shopping but have seen Instacart shoppers in the stores. I am wondering how you would end up netting $42 an hour. Someone on here said the fee was $9.99 per month so if that is the case Instacart could not afford to pay much. And most people I know that order put in pretty big orders which it seems would take a while to find in the store. I read a story about a shopper who said they sometimes had to visit multiple stores to fill the order. How many orders can you fill an hour? Here in my city the stores make the Instacart person do the picking off the shelf. Those tips must be pretty big! Just curious.
@Capurato wrote:
@SoCalMama wrote:
@Capurato wrote:
Has anyone else picked up delivery as a side gig?
Nope, but I am keeping delivery people busy.
I’ve read on Reddit stories of customers orders being wrong, stolen etc however I think that’s the exception and not the norm. I’ve had many customers ask if they could personally request me to shop for them (they can’t) and it would be cool if I could.
I’ve made more with tips than from the Instacart fees and even without tips, more than I did mystery shopping.
Anyone see anything wrong with conducting a mystery shop while shopping for an Instacart customer? To me it’s a no brainer and pure profit as long as I do all requirements for both companies.
Instacart adds a surcharge to items customers purchase in addition to the delivery fees. Essentially. IC buys the items and then sells them to the customer at a marked up rate. I’ve read the average item is marked up 20%. I’ve added customer requested items to an order and saw it marked up triple digits (IE a $24 pack of chicken added cost the customer $93).
I try to exclusively shop Aldi and Costco. The options are limited, the stores are laid out in a manner which makes shopping smooth and I know the stores like the back of my hand. I generally can complete a $50 Costco batch (2 orders) with heavy pay in around an hour from start to final delivery. Routines and organization are key.
My experience apparently isn’t “normal” as many shoppers are in areas that don’t have as many shopping options.
@Capurato yes, I also have picked up delivery as a side gig in the past two months. But I do not do grocery delivery; instead, I do restaurant delivery, and I do it on my bike. It is fun, and I feel like I get paid to move and to get fresh air. I make about $25 an hour, and I enjoy the speedy gratification of completing each delivery. I like mystery shopping and bike delivery equally, but there's more delivery opportunity right now.
Are you a 1099 or W-2 employee while working for Instacart?
@Capurato wrote:
@SoCalMama wrote:
@Capurato wrote:
Has anyone else picked up delivery as a side gig?
Anyone see anything wrong with conducting a mystery shop while shopping for an Instacart customer? To me it’s a no brainer and pure profit as long as I do all requirements for both companies.
Shopping Arkansas, Louisiana, & Mississippi.
I'm actually making more delivering food than I do as a nurse...
Wow. I think marking chicken up from $24 to over $90 would give me a hissy fit if I were the customer doing the order. I don't spend that much on meat in a YEAR! I buy chicken 10 lbs. at a time when it's on sale for $0.39 a lb!
I don't see how anyone can make even the $25 an hour, more the less $42 an hour.
People must be tipping like crazy, in order to show their appreciation to people who are, still, literally putting their lives on the line in order to work daily.
Instacart, GrubHub, the rest of them just aren't available here. We don't have the population to warrant it.
I don't see how anyone can make even the $25 an hour, more the less $42 an hour.
People must be tipping like crazy, in order to show their appreciation to people who are, still, literally putting their lives on the line in order to work daily.
Instacart, GrubHub, the rest of them just aren't available here. We don't have the population to warrant it.
@ColoradoShops wrote:
@Capurato yes, I also have picked up delivery as a side gig in the past two months. But I do not do grocery delivery; instead, I do restaurant delivery, and I do it on my bike. It is fun, and I feel like I get paid to move and to get fresh air. I make about $25 an hour, and I enjoy the speedy gratification of completing each delivery. I like mystery shopping and bike delivery equally, but there's more delivery opportunity right now.
I love it! That’s great. Too bad you can’t do a delivery mystery shop, pick it up and deliver it to yourself hahaha!
Glad to hear that it’s been profitable for you so far.
@ceasesmith wrote:
Wow. I think marking chicken up from $24 to over $90 would give me a hissy fit if I were the customer doing the order. I don't spend that much on meat in a YEAR! I buy chicken 10 lbs. at a time when it's on sale for $0.39 a lb!
I don't see how anyone can make even the $25 an hour, more the less $42 an hour.
People must be tipping like crazy, in order to show their appreciation to people who are, still, literally putting their lives on the line in order to work daily.
Instacart, GrubHub, the rest of them just aren't available here. We don't have the population to warrant it.
I couldn’t believe it either. The customer showed me the electronic receipt when I arrived. I guess they had the money to spend. I routinely make more in tips than on Instacart “pay”.
The key here is going to stores that I know and aren’t usually out of stock. Replacing items for customers takes time and they often don’t like our replacements.
I agree with you about the chicken. I don’t even spend that much on steak!
@ArkLaMissshopping wrote:
Are you a 1099 or W-2 employee while working for Instacart?
@Capurato wrote:
@SoCalMama wrote:
@Capurato wrote:
Has anyone else picked up delivery as a side gig?
Anyone see anything wrong with conducting a mystery shop while shopping for an Instacart customer? To me it’s a no brainer and pure profit as long as I do all requirements for both companies.
1099. I set aside 30% for taxes.
@Capurato wrote:
Side note - I wonder if people are going to get used to delivery and not go back to shopping for themselves.
NO, that's not going to happen. There's no substitute for picking out my own groceries. I never know what I'm going to get when ordering food online. There are always too many unavailable items.
I agree with you, AZ, as far as choosing my own produce, meat, poultry, etc., but for many grocery items, I'll very likely continue with the delivery service for the foreseeable future.@AZwolfman wrote:
NO, that's not going to happen. There's no substitute for picking out my own groceries. I never know what I'm going to get when ordering food online. There are always too many unavailable items.
@Capurato @sealford
I wanted to share something extraordinary that happened this week - I did a bike delivery (it was two containers of takeout, to a complex maybe 5 blocks from the restaurant) and the customer contacted me saying it's a difficult time and s/he appreciated me and would tip me $100. I wasn't sure they'd follow through, but it showed up on my delivery app. A $100 tip! Blimey, that's never happened to me before! What a generous act.
Has anyone else ever received a memorable tip, during delivery or otherwise?
I wanted to share something extraordinary that happened this week - I did a bike delivery (it was two containers of takeout, to a complex maybe 5 blocks from the restaurant) and the customer contacted me saying it's a difficult time and s/he appreciated me and would tip me $100. I wasn't sure they'd follow through, but it showed up on my delivery app. A $100 tip! Blimey, that's never happened to me before! What a generous act.
Has anyone else ever received a memorable tip, during delivery or otherwise?
When the virus first hit I started having groceries delivered. In my area, you can do orders directly from the Kroger website for $9.95 and get the same prices as you do in the store. Or you can go through the Instacart app and pay $4.99 and prices are 20-40% higher. Obviously I was placing the order via the Kroger app not Instacart. I was paying $10 above my grocery cost and tipping an additional $15. Most of my friends said I was tipping too little, so I am not surprised the drivers were making good money.
The first few weeks out of stock items were hit or miss. I learned very quickly which items to allow substitutions on when I did allow substitution I gave explicit instructions on what they could substitute. I found very quickly also that which driver you have is very important when it came to what they couldn't find and what they substituted.
We did delivery for 6-8 weeks and then 2 weeks ago I realized that Kroger had also setup curbside pickup in our area. I switched to curbside pickup because there was no fee or tip involved, which saved me $25 a week. I do the same thing re substitutions and continue to have few problems.
Sure I don't always get every item on my grocery list and I lose the ability to browse for items. What I have been doing is basically ordering a little extra on each order. For instance let's say I want to 2 different meats this week that we will eat 2-3 times each. Since meat is harder to get, or predict what's available, I will order 3 meats. If 1 is out of stock I still have 2 things to cook. If I actually get 3 then I have 1 to put in the freezer, and the weeks I only get 1 I can pull one of those extras from when I got 3 out.
I am also not picky about produce and meat. Sure I could probably pick out a prettier roast but having one with more fat that I would have bought isn't really that big of a deal. I can trim. Or cook it out. And it's a trade off I am perfectly willing to take considering how significantly safer delivery or curbside pickup is. Especially in a place where not wearing a mask is a badge of honor.
Once the Coronas go away I will probably go to the grocery store some of the time, but will also probably do delivery or pickup some of the time as well. There's something to be said for walking down the aisle and saying, OMG that looks great I'm cooking that for dinner tonight. But right now it's just simply not worth it to me.
As for other items, I have not been in a retail store or a restaurant since March 16th with the exception of the garden center at Lowe's, because it's an outside environment. The things I need from inside the store I order for curbside pickup. I have found that everything I need I can order for delivery or curbside pickup with little or no extra cost and generally with less hassle. I've become a big fan.
Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/31/2020 11:44PM by bgriffin.
The first few weeks out of stock items were hit or miss. I learned very quickly which items to allow substitutions on when I did allow substitution I gave explicit instructions on what they could substitute. I found very quickly also that which driver you have is very important when it came to what they couldn't find and what they substituted.
We did delivery for 6-8 weeks and then 2 weeks ago I realized that Kroger had also setup curbside pickup in our area. I switched to curbside pickup because there was no fee or tip involved, which saved me $25 a week. I do the same thing re substitutions and continue to have few problems.
Sure I don't always get every item on my grocery list and I lose the ability to browse for items. What I have been doing is basically ordering a little extra on each order. For instance let's say I want to 2 different meats this week that we will eat 2-3 times each. Since meat is harder to get, or predict what's available, I will order 3 meats. If 1 is out of stock I still have 2 things to cook. If I actually get 3 then I have 1 to put in the freezer, and the weeks I only get 1 I can pull one of those extras from when I got 3 out.
I am also not picky about produce and meat. Sure I could probably pick out a prettier roast but having one with more fat that I would have bought isn't really that big of a deal. I can trim. Or cook it out. And it's a trade off I am perfectly willing to take considering how significantly safer delivery or curbside pickup is. Especially in a place where not wearing a mask is a badge of honor.
Once the Coronas go away I will probably go to the grocery store some of the time, but will also probably do delivery or pickup some of the time as well. There's something to be said for walking down the aisle and saying, OMG that looks great I'm cooking that for dinner tonight. But right now it's just simply not worth it to me.
As for other items, I have not been in a retail store or a restaurant since March 16th with the exception of the garden center at Lowe's, because it's an outside environment. The things I need from inside the store I order for curbside pickup. I have found that everything I need I can order for delivery or curbside pickup with little or no extra cost and generally with less hassle. I've become a big fan.
There are reasons that a body stays in motion
At the moment only demons come to mind
At the moment only demons come to mind
Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/31/2020 11:44PM by bgriffin.
@ColoradoShops wrote:
@Capurato @sealford
I wanted to share something extraordinary that happened this week - I did a bike delivery (it was two containers of takeout, to a complex maybe 5 blocks from the restaurant) and the customer contacted me saying it's a difficult time and s/he appreciated me and would tip me $100. I wasn't sure they'd follow through, but it showed up on my delivery app. A $100 tip! Blimey, that's never happened to me before! What a generous act.
Has anyone else ever received a memorable tip, during delivery or otherwise?
That’s great! I love hearing stores like that. I’ve never received a tip that large, but I have received cash tips on top of the tip in the system and large tips on double Costco batches.
Glad to hear the bike is paying off!
I was a server back in the last century when we were still called waitresses. My best tip was from a couple who were stockings salespersons. They gave me a pair of their support hose as a tip. In those days most people tipped very little in my state. I wore those "hose" every day to work and washed them out at night. They wore like iron and my legs thanked that couple every day.. I saved so much money not buying stockings that were required and got runs after one day.
@sandyf..... ".... a server back in the last century when we were still called waitresses." I still refer to them as waitresses, and still refer to flight attendants as stewardess. I guess I'm stuck in my old ways.
For me the restaurant people changed when I started as a mystery shopper and they always used the word server.
@1forum1 wrote:
When did it all change?
Ouch! Do the customers not know this, or just don't care?@Capurato wrote:
Instacart adds a surcharge to items customers purchase in addition to the delivery fees. Essentially. IC buys the items and then sells them to the customer at a marked up rate. I’ve read the average item is marked up 20%. I’ve added customer requested items to an order and saw it marked up triple digits (IE a $24 pack of chicken added cost the customer $93).
"Let me offer you my definition of social justice: I keep what I earn and you keep what you earn. Do you disagree? Well then tell me how much of what I earn belongs to you - and why?” ~Walter Williams
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/28/2020 01:00AM by iShop123.
I am still furloughed from my full time and only job which is mystery shopping.
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