Instacart partners with Uber Eats to offer restaurant deliveries

Grocery delivery company Instacart is partnering with Uber Eats to offer a new perk to its customers: restaurant delivery.

San Francisco-based Instacart said Tuesday that its U.S. shoppers will see a “Restaurants” tab in the company’s app in the coming weeks. Restaurant orders will be delivered by Uber Eats drivers.

Instacart said its Instacart Plus members – who pay $99 per year or $9.99 per month for free grocery deliveries over $35 – will also get free restaurant delivery for orders over $35. Regular Instacart members will be charged Uber Eats delivery fees.

Instacart said it will earn an affiliate fee with every order, but it didn’t reveal any other financial details of the partnership.

Instacart said most Americans shop for groceries — either online or in a store — at least once per week. But more than one-third also order takeout or delivery at least once a week, and it wants to help them meet that need as well.

The deal will give Instacart customers more benefits in the competitive grocery delivery market. Instacart currently controls around 25% of that market in the U.S., behind Walmart at 51%, according to YipitData, a market research company.

Other delivery companies, including DoorDash and Uber Eats itself, also have a small but growing share of that market.

Uber Eats said the deal with Instacart would drive more customers to its restaurant partners, especially in the suburban neighborhoods where the grocery delivery company has the most users.

In documents filed ahead of its initial public offering last summer, Instacart said it had 7.7 million monthly active users. The companies didn't say how many of those customers are also Uber Eats users.