Walgreens will partner with Chef’d to introduce meal kits at 30 Walgreens and Duane Reade stores in the New York area, according to CNBC. The pilot marks the expansion of a collaboration between Chef’d and Smithfield Foods that launched in May 2018, putting the retailer’s meal kits on shelves at Costco, Harris Teeter, Tops, HyVee, Weis and Gelson’s Markets locations.
The participating Walgreens and Duane Reade shops are in Brooklyn, Manhattan, Forest Hills and Yonkers, N.Y., as well as Hoboken and Jersey City, N.J. The kits will come in three varieties, each featuring both a main dish and sides.
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Meal kits are a growing presence at grocery retailers, with Kroger acquiring Home Chef for approximately $200 million and Walmart rolling out its own kits to 2,000 stores. However, the Walgreens partnership marks the first time a drugstore chain has embraced the concept.
Chef’d has been at the forefront of finding ways to grow outside of the direct-to-customer subscription model favored by meal kit companies. Chef’d is working with Byte Foods to stock meal kits at 100 unattended retail locations near offices throughout the San Francisco Bay Area and Sacramento, Calif. The meal kit retailer also has launched customizable kits through the Innit app, allowing shoppers to plan a meal and choose its delivery date rather than adhere to a specific schedule.
