On-demand delivery startup Postmates has made it possible for customers to order from all their favorite restaurants, charging a small per-delivery fee for the service. Today, through a partnership with online clothing retailer Everlane, it’s showing that it can reduce the time it takes for customers to get select apparel delivered from days down to within an hour.
To date, Postmates has primarily focused on the on-demand food delivery market, bringing lunch and dinner to hungry customers. Deliveries are made within an hour, with Postmates charging a $4.99 delivery fee for the service. But with the introduction of Everlane Now, the company is showing that its service can be used with a wider variety of partners.
Everlane, meanwhile, has operated mainly as a purely online retail brand with a rabid following of fans. Customers purchase items from its website and have them delivered a few days later. The Postmates partnership will drastically reduce the amount of time it will take for customers to get select items dropped off that their home or office.
Throughout September, customers in San Francisco will be able to shop from the Everlane Now site weekdays from 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. and have items delivered within an hour. At launch Everlane Now will have a pretty limited selection of items, including those from its T-shirts and Reverse Denim bag collection, but it will be adding more styles each week until October 3. While individual items will carry Postmates’ usual $4.95 delivery fee, delivery will be free for any orders of two items or more.
The Everlane Now partnership shows how Postmates could open up and partner with other third-party retailers to power ever-faster deliveries. While the food vertical has been an obvious first starting point for the company, customers are increasingly looking to get other goods delivered quickly.
We’re likely to see Postmates working with other brands over time as it integrates with more retailers to power their same-day delivery services. That said, there are a number of other players that are going after this market, with major companies like eBay and Google offering their own same-day delivery services for good purchased from nearby stores.