Uber is expanding its delivery service.
Recode reported today that the ride-hailing company is now offering its UberRush program in San Francisco and Chicago after testing the same-day on-demand delivery service in New York City.
UberRush builds off the infrastructure and huge swath of drivers Uber has for its transportation service and is targeted at smaller brick-and-mortar retailers and restaurants who will charge customers $5 to $7 for delivery, Recode reported. Businesses like ChowNow and BloomNet are using Uber to give customers a way have purchased items delivered on the same day.
Uber originally tested a delivery program in New York City that let individuals hire couriers to deliver products and is now more focused on partnering with retailers for same-day delivery.
There are a bevy of other companies competing to deliver items to your door within hours. Amazon is certainly one of them, as the Seattle retailer offers its one-hour Prime Now delivery service in 13 markets and recently launched a new Prime Now restaurant delivery service in Seattle last month. Amazon is also rolling out a program called Amazon Flex that uses everyday drivers to deliver Amazon packages in their own cars.
Other competitors include Postmates — which has delivery partnerships with Starbucks and Chipotle — Deliv, Instacart, and Sidecar, which originally competed with Uber in the ride-hailing market but has since shifted focused to deliveries. Sidecar says it has the largest B2B on-demand network in the U.S. and CEO Sunil Paul told us earlier this year that deliveries made up more than half of the company’s revenue in San Francisco just three months after Sidecar launched the service.
Though Uber’s revenue primarily comes from transporting people around cities, the company is clearly looking to expand into other verticals with its infrastructure now in place. It is rolling out its UberEATS food delivery platform around the country and tested a drug store delivery service this past summer.
