by Brittain Ladd | Jul 29, 2026 | Delivery, Retail
Last week, a Tesla Model Y delivered Chinese takeout to a customer in Austin. No driver. A remote supervisor. A text message instead of an app. That sounds like a novelty item. It isn’t. Tso Chinese Takeout & Delivery, Autolane, and Nash didn’t launch an...
by Mindee Forman | Jun 19, 2026 | Delivery, Newsletter, No Retreat, No Surrender
Introduction I wrote one of my first articles on LinkedIn on June 18, 2016. The article is about autonomous trucks. In the article, I asked this question: If you don’t need the driver, why do you need the truck? You can read the article here. I continue to...
by Brittain Ladd | Jan 6, 2025 | Delivery, E-Commerce, Grocery, Logistics, Microfulfillment, No Retreat, No Surrender, Retail, Strategy, Supply Chains
In 2013, executives at Lidl made the decision to enter the U.S. grocery market. Lidl is a German-owned discounter that operates over 12,000 stores located in 31 countries. Lidl competes on price hence the reason why it is referred to as a discounter. Lidl sells around...
by Brittain Ladd | Jan 1, 2025 | AI, Delivery, E-Commerce, Grocery, Logistics, Microfulfillment, No Retreat, No Surrender, Retail
This article originally appeared in Forbes. July 8, 2018 Aside from Amazon’s acquisition of Whole Foods, few grocers generated as much press and excitement in 2017 than Lidl’s arrival in the United States. Opening its headquarters in Arlington, Virginia,...
by Brittain Ladd | Oct 13, 2024 | Delivery, E-Commerce, Grocery, Logistics, Microfulfillment, No Retreat, No Surrender, Retail
In The Beginning I joined Amazon in 2014. My first role was designing strategies for Amazon to become a 3PL. I have extensive supply chain and logistics experience. I then transferred into a team focused on designing fulfillment strategies for groceries. To ensure...
by Brittain Ladd | Dec 4, 2023 | AI, Delivery, E-Commerce, Grocery, Logistics, Microfulfillment, No Retreat, No Surrender, Retail, Strategy, Supply Chains
What you are about to read is my opinion. Beginning in late 2022 and throughout 2023, current and former employees of the grocery micro-fulfillment company, TakeOff, began to reach out to me to provide updates about what’s going on inside the company. I’m...
