Retail giant Walmart is expanding its drone delivery service in Dallas-Fort Worth by adding services to two superstores in the coming weeks via Wing, Alphabet’s drone delivery sister company.
The Walmart Supercenter at 8555 Preston Road in Frisco will be the next to get the new Wing service in the months ahead. Walmart called that store the “most-requested expansion area.”
Another unannounced Walmart Supercenter store also will get drones before the end of the year, the company said.
Walmart U.S.’s senior vice president of innovation & automation, Prathibha Rajashekhar, announced that the retail giant has not only been piloting drone deliveries for the past two years but has also seen considerable success. “Over that time, we’ve grown to offer it across seven states and 36 stores, completing more than 10,000 safe deliveries,” Rajashekhar said in a company blog post.
The Wing service enables Walmart to reach an additional 60,000 homes in DFW, the SVP said.
Last December, Walmart began drone deliveries from 11 Dallas-area stores via a DroneUp partnership. Those drone hubs include Dallas, Garland, Mesquite, Murphy, Plano, Richardson, Rowlett, and The Colony.
More neighborhoods to get drone deliveries
In another blog post, Wing CFO Shannon Nash said that shoppers can order groceries, quick meals, household essentials, over-the-counter medicines, and more for delivery.
“First and foremost — it means a whole lot more of you are going to be able to access the service,” Nash said in her blog post. “The No. 1 question we get from folks around the Dallas area is when drone delivery will be available at their homes.”
According to Nash, the drone services’ new hours of operation will be 10:30 a.m. until 6:30 p.m., allowing for late shoppers to place orders. Also, Walmart said it is extending the service to six days a week, excluding Wednesdays.
Nash said the drones are reliable and fast — they fly at 65 mph. She said that shoppers can get their delivery in under 30 minutes.
Wing has a remote operations center in Coppell.
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R E A D N E X T
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