Amazon Makes Milk Now

My brother lives in New York City, where anything he wants is at his fingertips almost 24/7. Still, he told me a few months ago that it had been "forever" since he bought something at a brick-and-mortar store. "If I can get it shipped to my apartment on Amazon, why would I go to a store?" Clothes, pet food, home supplies, tech stuff, grocery delivery: it's all there, with free shipping if you're a Prime member. The Amazon-ification of our lives continues unabated with this latest news that Amazon has introduced its own private label milk and other dairy products.

Grocery Dive reports the milk, whipped cream, half-and-half, and lactose-free products are sold under the Happy Belly brand, which is Amazon's first private-label line besides Whole Foods store brand. (Amazon acquired Whole Foods in 2017.) Amazon already has some private-label grocery items as well as a line of basic fashion called Amazon Essentials, but currently only 2 percent of its private-label items are groceries. In 2017, private-label brands made up about 17 percent of all grocery-store purchases in the U.S., according to data from the Food Marketing Institute and IRI.

Grocery Dive theorizes that Amazon's expansion into more private-label groceries could signal a renewed push behind AmazonFresh, its grocery-delivery service. The Takeout theorizes that we are one step closer to Amazon Echoes implanted directly into our brains which automatically order Amazon milk and Amazon cat litter a moment before our cortexes even consciously register that we've run out.