Amazon has announced it is shutting down its standalone Prime Now fast delivery app at the end of the year.
Users who want fast delivery on their grocery and other orders will be able to do so through the Amazon app or the website.
The Prime Now service was launched in 2014 with the aim to deliver a range of goods including books, groceries, toys and household items in under two hours.
The service is currently operational in 5,000 cities and towns and the ecommerce giant uses dedicated Prime Now fulfilment centres to handle the large volume of orders.
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“To make this experience even more seamless for customers, we are moving the experience from a separate Prime Now app onto the Amazon app and website so customers can shop all Amazon has to offer from one convenient location,” Amazon’s vice president of grocery Stephenie Landry said in a blog post.
Shoppers will have the option to choose the two hour delivery service on non-grocery items via the app or website while all two hour grocery delivery will remain available on Amazon Fresh or Whole Foods.
The company also announced that its third-party retailers that were offered the Prime Now service will be transferred over to Amazon.
“In 2014, I wrote a six-page document outlining a service that would allow customers to get last-minute items in about an hour,” Landry added.
“We even gave the project the internal code name ‘Houdini.’ In just 111 days, our team took the concept outlined in that six-page document and turned it into Prime Now, which became the foundation for Amazon’s ultrafast grocery and same-day delivery businesses.”
Amazon’s grocery delivery arm has boomed in recent years, with a fourth store being opened in London earlier this week.
The company also acquired Whole Foods in 2017, in a deal worth $13.4 billion.