Beauty on-demand: Walgreens Boots Alliance partners with Deliveroo in UK

Announced today, the partnership would see 14 of Walgreens’ Boots UK stores working with Deliveroo to deliver products to consumers at-home, including several stores across London. The tie-up was being run as a pilot scheme initially but would be expanded to more stores “if the pilot stores are successful”​, Boots UK said.

400+ health and beauty items delivered on-demand​

From today, the Deliveroo platform now offered more than 400 of Boots’ health and beauty products for home delivery, including makeup, skin care, baby care and toiletries from an array of brands like No7, Soltan, CeraVe and The Inkey List, as well as food and drink items and medicines for minor ailments.

Whilst Boots UK already offered a next day click and collect service, and home delivery for online orders, the deal with Deliveroo marked its first on-demand delivery partnership that aimed to provide “greater speed to customers”, ​with deliveries able to be completed in as little as 20 minutes in some instances.

Paula Bobbett, director of boots.com at Boots UK, said it was an exciting partnership for the retailer and carried important implications for consumers.

“Our online business continues to grow, and this partnership offers our customers a new way to access our products quickly and easily,”​ Bobbett said.

Between March 1, 2020 and March 1, 2021, Boots saw online sales rise 85% on the previous year.

‘More choice and selection’ on Deliveroo​

Carlo Mocci, chief business officer for UK & Ireland at Deliveroo, said the company was delighted to be working with Boots UK.

“Boots is the UK’s leading health and beauty retailer and the top consumer choice for high-quality and popular products. This partnership will mean more choice and selection for our consumers (…) and will create more work for riders across the UK,”​ Mocci said.

Deliveroo already worked with a number of health and beauty retailers and brands across the UK, including Holland & Barrett, Lloyds Pharmacy and Benefit Cosmetics. The platform, however, remained largely dedicated to restaurant and grocery.

Worldwide, Deliveroo worked with 115,000 restaurants and grocers across 12 markets and had more than 100,000 riders and 2,000+ employees. Deliveroo revenues for the first half (H1) of 2021 were up 82% on the previous year, sitting at just over €1bn (£922.5m) with gross profit at €308m (£263.9m) – up 75%. Adjusted EBITDA, however, was down €31.5m (£27m) “as higher gross profit was largely offset by increased investments to support future growth”,​ according to the company.