Walmart's Jet.com is launching its own line of groceries to compete with Amazon
Walmart's Jet.com is the latest retailer to double down on the online grocery war.
The site announced Thursday that it's launching its own in-house grocery label that will encompass household staples like coffee, olive oil, laundry detergent, and paper towels.
The product line, called Uniquely J, will target "metro millennial" consumers with perhaps more emphasis on quality than your average generic store brand. Walmart has been trying to position Jet as the hipper alternative to its own cheap, mass-market brand with a stable of trendy names like Bonobos and Modcloth available exclusively on the site.
Walmart bought the cash-flush startup for $3 billion last summer in a bid to beef up its online operation.
The rollout also comes as arch-rival Amazon has been ramping up its own private-label grocery offerings. That effort got a huge boost when Amazon bought Whole Foods and added its established brands like 365 Everyday Value to its roster.
Jet parent Walmart has of course been pouring resources into the online grocery war too with experiments like a giant vending machine for store pick-up and straight-to-fridge delivery.
Jet also opened a trendy temporary grocery storefront in New York earlier this year.
Private-label grocery lines tend to be trickier to market than those for commodity items that are less reliant on brand names. Perhaps that's why Jet is kicking the undertaking off with a mix of utility items like paper towels and laundry detergent and food items on which labels matter more to consumers.
A Jet spokesperson said the brand will be introduced over the course of coming months, and more items will be added as it goes.
Patrick Kulp is a Business Reporter at Mashable. Patrick covers digital advertising, online retail and the future of work. A graduate of UC Santa Barbara with a degree in political science and economics, he previously worked at the Pacific Coast Business Times.
