Amazon Pantry Tipped To Expand Quick-Ship Foods And Beverages

It would appear that Amazon is aiming to expand their grasp of the consumer goods universe with a program called Amazon Pantry. This service would expand Amazon's collection of goods shipped in low-cost packages beyond their already expansive set of foods and dry goods. Amazon is said to be going into more direct competition with the likes of Costco and Sam's Club with this effort.

It's suggested by sources speaking with USA Today that the service will be run by a senior manager in vendor management and consumables at Amazon by the name of Billy Hegeman. This service will be launched inside of 2014 and will be aimed at Amazon Prime members.

It's not yet known if this Pantry vision will be available only to those members of Amazon Prime, but it would appear that the service will be enhanced by that membership. This expansion will bring around 2,000 products not yet available on Amazon, these including cleaning supplies, dry grocery items, canned goods, small beverages, and kitchen paper rolls. This launch may play out as an expansion of the service AmazonFresh, already launched in San Fransisco.

Perhaps the oddest part of this program is the set box size. According to these same sources, Amazon Pantry will have users selecting as many of these items as they like to be shipped in a single box. If this box does not exceed a certain weight and they all fit, this box will be shipped for a "small fee". We're going to go ahead and guess that this fee is either under $10 USD or free – whatever seems more pleasing to the consumer.

We'll likely see Amazon Pantry appearing within the next few months or inside the first half of 2014, readied for either the harsh winter we're in right this minute or the lazy summer ahead. We shall see!