As soon as we were told to shelter-in-place back in mid-March, I immediately began to rely heavily on delivery services. Four months later that's still the case, at least for me. Since my state (I'm in NJ) has been slowly reopening though, I have started taking baby steps to shopping in person. But it's mainly been at individual stores with outdoor entrances and strict monitoring around capacity and masks. Still, I think it's a long way to go for me to feel 100% relaxed inside a grocery or a mall. So I thought I'd share reviews of the delivery services I've been relying on and will continue to use for the foreseeable future.
I tried Instacart a week into the lockdown. I had heard of the service before but having my groceries delivered just wasn't something I needed or considered until COVID happened. From the start, I was extremely impressed with the service. I've only had one bad experience and maybe a couple so-so ones but overall, it's been excellent. The way it works is that you can choose to shop from a wide range of local stores. I always order from ShopRite but they have Target, Stop & Shop, ACME, Coscto, The Wine Club, and even Staples and Petco. And that doesn't even cover the half the available stores! You order in advance, choose your delivery date and on the day of, the shopper who picks up your order texts you through the app and will be in communication the entire time. For example, if something needs to be replaced because what I wanted was out of stock, I've had shoppers text me photos of what I can choose from which is super helpful. Because you do pay for delivery and tip, it is a bit more expensive than shopping on your own but I find the convenience of the service well worth it. And if any of the items are missing, damaged or not to your liking, the customer service is quick and helpful with giving out refunds or credit. Some personal tips: set your deliveries for the morning to ensure you're getting the freshest produce and make sure you're available to chat with the shopper to get exactly what you want. I highly recommend giving this a try if you haven't already!
Friday night takeout has become one of the highlights of my week and my go-to app for ordering food is DoorDash. Even though I do have UberEats and Seamless on my phone as well, DoorDash is the one I always open. The app is just really easy to use, I like how the categories are set up, and they have a bunch of promos going on that you can take advantage of. It was also a great way to support local restaurants when everything was closed at the start of the pandemic. Even though there was curbside pickup available and now outdoor dining has become an option, I'm still not doing either of those things. I still prefer to rely on having my food delivered for now (and for who knows how long) so I know I'll be continuing to use this app a lot.
Back when I could go grocery shopping every week, I would always buy a bouquet of flowers. Fresh flowers at home immediately brightens up any space in my humble opinion and it was so easy to find a nice bouquet for cheap at Trader Joe's. I hadn't bought any flowers this entire until my birthday. I had received flowers from The Bouqs before (courtesy of some amazing friends) so I decided to give their service a try and send myself a bouquet. The flowers were arrived on time and were very carefully packed into the box. I was actually pretty impressed with the care put into it and of course, the flowers were beautiful. It made me realize how much I've loved having flowers at home! And since I was so happy with the service, I decided to sign up for a monthly subscription. It is on the pricier side so I went with a monthly service but they offer bi-monthly if that's more affordable for you or bi-weekly if you're willing to splurge.
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Are you a fan of any of these services?
Or, are there any others you'd recommend?
I'd love to hear from you!
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