Dive Brief:
- Grocery e-commerce firm ShopHero has been acquired by Dot Foods, the largest food industry redistributor in North America, the companies announced on Thursday.
- The acquisition will boost ShopHero’s presence in the online grocery platform space, the two companies’ CEOs said in the announcement. The companies did not disclose the financial terms of the transaction.
- In a note to customers and partners, ShopHero said they can expect to see increased levels of service as the company looks to expand its online capabilities.
Dive Insight:
Founded in 2015, ShopHero provides grocers with a locally-branded online shopping platform and supports hundreds of retailers across the U.S. and Canada, including the Independent Grocers Alliance (IGA) and Filipino supermarket chain Island Pacific. It is one of several e-commerce providers aimed at helping independent grocers.
Meanwhile, Dot Foods operates 12 distribution centers in the U.S. and carries 133,000 products from 1,000 food industry manufacturers. Its affiliate Dot Transportation brings food and retail products to distributors across more than 50 countries.
“We are now well-positioned to move faster, with better products and greater levels of service and support than ever before," Matt Garner, CEO of ShopHero, said about the acquisition in the announcement. Garner said that Dot Foods “stands fully behind our mission,” bringing considerable resources to further the e-commerce firm’s growth.
Freshop, another grocery e-commerce provider that works with independents, was acquired at the start of the year by technology company NCR. The acquisitions in the grocery e-commerce space follow an online shopping boom spurred by the pandemic, which has accelerated online grocery adoption. Last fall, Mercatus and research firm Incisiv projected e-commerce will account for 21.5% of total grocery sales, worth $250 billion, by 2025.
