Dive Brief:
- Groupon has purchased SnapSaves, a grocery app that launched last year. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
- SnapSaves offers shoppers instant cash back if they buy a grocery item in one store that was cheaper at a different store. Customers simply take a photograph of their store receipt. If they've paid more than the price shown in a daily deal, they get cash back.
- SnapSaves has grown to some 2 million users in Canada since its debut in August. The Groupon purchase gives the app -- and the grocery brands that partner with it -- access to a much larger market in the U.S.
Dive Insight:
Walking through a supermarket today is like watching a commercial for an iPhone or an Android. Seemingly everyone is using an app of some kind for some purpose.
But as crowded as the grocery app space has become, there is something about SnapSaves that has let it stand out in Canada. It's likely to do the same here. SnapSaves is similar to Walmart's Savings Catcher app, which Walmart said processed some 1 million receipts when it offered the app in test markets. That was enough to prompt the world's largest retailer to announced last month that it would roll out the product across the country.
Perhaps SnapSaves' method of comparing prices after you buy will feel less strange to consumers once Walmart pours its considerable marketing expertise into Savings Catcher.