eBay announced today that its local shopping service eBay Now, previously only available in mobile app form, is now launching on the desktop.
The service lets customers look at products from stores, place an order online, and then have the items delivered to a specified location. eBay says this usually happens within the hour.
Until now, eBay Now has only been available in San Francisco, New York and San Jose, but it’s expanding into the Bay Area Peninsula, Brooklyn and Queens today, and Chicago and Dallas later this summer. If the service proves to be successful, there’s no reason not to assume they won’t continue to expand into more regions.
“We are using our mobile leadership to lead in multi-screen,” says Dane Glasgow, VP, Local and Mobile at eBay. “We want to make every screen shoppable, and eBay Now is the latest example of how we’re bringing that to life.”
According to Glasgow, over half of eBay Now’s orders are made between 9AM and 5PM. In other words, the work day. The company cites research from Forrester indicating that 90% of all shopping is still done in physical stores. Maybe eBay can still change that yet.
Among the stores taking part in eBay Now are: Target, Best Buy, Auto Zone, Office Depot, Macy’s, Toys ‘R’ Us/Babies ‘R’ Us, Walgreens, GNC, Guitar Center, Urban Outfitters, Radioshack and Home Depot.