Beelivery – a Helping Hand for Busy Bees
As our worlds have increasingly become confined to our homes in recent months, online delivery services, already a staple of lazy nights in and barely warranted shopping sprees, have taken on an even greater significance.
For many of us, needing to pop to the shop for a last-minute purchase, an annoyance at the best of times, has now become hugely impractical, if not completely impossible, especially for those of us with kids. Enter Beelivery – an online service which brings purchases to your doorstep within 90 minutes of placing an order, by linking customers with local drivers. The concept is simple. After an order is placed, the delivery is made from a nearby shop, saving users the hassle of making the purchase in person. As an avid online shopper, I was intrigued to give Beelivery a go.
The first step in my trial run was simply entering my postcode on the website. I was then confronted with the much more difficult task of deciding what exactly I wanted to include in my order. Carefully skirting around essentials such as cleaning products, basic medicines, and nappies – which might have proved useful to my wider family – I headed straight for the drinks and snacks sections, in order to stock up on treats which I thought I deserved after a week of pretending to be a teacher, looking after baby and working from home. Having filled my basket with as much junk food as I could justify, I commenced my browse of the rest of the goods which the company had on offer. Although the choice wasn’t overwhelming, with largely only the major household names being represented, there was nevertheless a good selection of products. Any item which you might reasonably want in your basket during a weekly shop was available to purchase, from staple fruit and veg, to a selection of cooked and raw meat, to ready meals, pet food, and even batteries.
With my order finalised after much deliberation, I proceeded to the virtual checkout. After handing over the usual details, I settled back to track my driver, with an eagerness which some may consider worrying. About 20 minutes into my surveillance, my phone rang. It turned out to be my driver himself, wanting to clarify whether I’d be happy with certain substitutions. During the checkout process, I had unchecked the ‘allow substitutions’ box, largely due to a number of unpleasant experiences with deliveries from large shops, who shall remain unnamed, but who seemed to assume there was no difference between toilet paper and kitchen roll. I was extremely grateful to my driver for checking in, however, as he very sensibly wanted to switch out one flavour of cider, which wasn’t available, for another. I agreed wholeheartedly that an alternative flavour of cider would be better than no cider at all, and went back to following his progress on my screen. At precisely 75 minutes after I placed my order, I was unpacking my purchases.
Such a simple, quick service is undoubtedly a blessing right now. Instead of a venture out into the unknown, armed with gloves, masks, and quite possibly a child you would rather not take along, you can simply sit down at your laptop, and whichever household essential you’re missing will be with you in the blink of an eye. As for the future – I predict Beelivery will continue to be a lifesaver for busy parents, lazy shoppers, and careless cooks, who always remember that key ingredient they don’t have in their cupboards just after they start work on a meal!
This looks like a fabulous idea, and service.