Sam’s Club Just Unveiled the Most Interesting New Way for Customers to Shop

Sam’s Club recently announced that it has a new pilot where shopper can scan purchases at the store and then have them shipped to their home.

The warehouse club is testing a new app-based feature called Scan & Ship, that allows people to use a smartphone to buy items in the club and send purchases
directly to the home.

The Walmart-owned membership club is giving Costco a run for its money with such a pilot. Customers at select clubs can browse the aisles, buy items that will fit in the car trunk and then ship other purchases directly to their home. They can check out all purchases in a single transaction on their smartphones.

According to Sam’s Club CEO Kathryn McLay, the technology as a way to improve the customer experience and build on its gains over the past year.

“We want to have great items. We want to have disruptive prices. And we want to make sure that we’re providing convenience to our members,” McLay said in an interview with CNBC earlier this month. “What we really learned through the pandemic was that we need to stay true to that strategy.”

The Scan & Ship service is the newest way that Sam’s Club is using digital options to stand out from competitors. It will become a feature of Scan & Go, a feature that allows customers to ring up purchases with a smartphone as they add items to their shopping carts.

Total membership at Sam’s Club had hit an all-time high in the first quarter. The company does not disclose how many members it has.

With nearly 600 stores and about 100,000 employees, the company launched Scan & Go in 2016.

“I keep saying to the team, it felt like it was a product that we created, which was waiting for a moment like a pandemic, because people just absolutely flocked to contactless payment. And there it was ready to go,” McLay said in June.

Disclaimer: We have no position in any of the companies mentioned and have not been compensated for this article.