IANS | 16 Jan, 2024
Ride-hailing major Uber is shutting down its alcohol delivery service called Drizly which it acquired for $1.1 billion.
The company had planned to integrate Drizly into Uber Eats but never succeeded.
Drizly brand will be discontinued by March, reports Axios.
"After
three years of Drizly operating independently within the Uber family,
we’ve decided to close the business and focus on our core Uber Eats
strategy of helping consumers get almost anything – from food to
groceries to alcohol – all on a single app," an Uber spokesperson said
in a statement.
"We’re grateful to the Drizly team for their many
contributions to the growth of the BevAlc delivery category as the
original industry pioneer," the spokesperson added.
Drizly provided backend technology that let local liquor stores provide their own deliveries.
In
2020, it confirmed a hack that exposed information of around 2.5
million customers. It was the leading on-demand alcohol marketplace in
the US, available in more than 1,400 cities.
After alcohol at
your doorstep, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi had even planned to deliver
cannabis or marijuana when "the road is clear".
The Uber CEO had
told CNBC News in 2021 that the ride-hailing company could start
delivering weed once federal regulation allows the company to do so.
"When
the road is clear for cannabis, when federal laws come into play, we're
absolutely going to take a look at it," Khosrowshahi was quoted as
saying in the report.
Marijuana still remains illegal under the US federal law, but some lawmakers have expressed a willingness to change the policy.