Early 1990s Startup Tested Grocery Delivery Years Before the Digital Boom The news journal (JOINT Collaborative journalism) MARK MARYMONT
Young Entrepreneur Builds Early Retail Delivery Network in Delaware and Philadelphia
In the early 1990s, long before smartphone apps made grocery delivery a common convenience, a young Delaware entrepreneur was already experimenting with a model that would later transform the retail industry.
Marc Falcone launched Shopping Delivery Service of America (SDSA), a company designed to handle grocery shopping for customers who preferred not to spend time navigating supermarket aisles. Operating out of Greenville, Delaware, Falcone built a service that allowed customers to place orders by telephone or fax, after which SDSA employees would shop for the items and deliver them directly to customers’ homes.
Falcone said the idea came from years of helping his own parents with grocery shopping.
“Some people enjoy shopping,” Falcone explained in an early interview. “But for many others it’s time-consuming and inconvenient. We’re offering them a way to get that time back.”
A Convenience-Driven Business Model
Customers using the service were required to place a minimum order of $50 in groceries. SDSA charged a service fee of 10 percent of the total bill, along with a $2 delivery charge. Orders placed in the morning were typically delivered the same evening between 6 p.m. and 8:30 p.m.
The company also offered an additional service for customers who preferred to pick up their groceries themselves. In this option, the company would shop for the groceries at partner store locations and have the order prepared and ready for pickup in a designated area outside the store.
Falcone’s early customers included busy young couples, dual-income families, and older residents who could no longer drive. “A lot of our customers are young families where both parents work,” Falcone said. “They simply don’t have the time to handle grocery shopping along with everything else.”
Technology Behind the Service
To support the operation, Falcone implemented computerized customer profiles that tracked repeat orders and shopping preferences. These profiles allowed SDS employees to quickly recreate typical grocery lists for regular customers, streamlining the ordering process and reducing errors.
The underlying technology for this system was developed with assistance from Falcone’s father, an entrepreneur and founder of UCSC. The company specialized in computer management systems and software products used for facilities management by Fortune 500 corporations as well as government organizations.
The software expertise behind UCSC helped provide SDS with an early technological framework for managing customer information and orders—years before online shopping platforms or mobile applications existed. In many ways, the system functioned as an early precursor to the digital customer accounts and order histories now used by modern grocery-delivery platforms.
Partnership With Regional Grocery Chains
To support the business, Falcone negotiated partnerships with regional grocery stores, first working with several Thriftway locations before securing an agreement with the supermarket chain Pathmark.
Under the arrangement, Pathmark stores in Delaware’s New Castle County participated in an early pilot program that allowed SDS to purchase groceries directly from their shelves for customer orders. Each participating store effectively served as a distribution center for SDS’s delivery operations.
Falcone equipped his delivery vehicles with cooler chests to keep refrigerated items fresh during transport from store to customer.
Expansion Plans
As demand grew, Falcone began exploring expansion into nearby markets. To support this growth, SDS expanded an existing partnership with a fleet van operator capable of equipping delivery vehicles with refrigeration for the targeted expansion areas.
At the same time, Falcone was already looking beyond groceries. The company began negotiating with a national restaurant chain to test a fast-food delivery service — an idea that would not become widespread for many years.
Moving Into Corporate Food Delivery
By 1994, SDS had begun expanding into the Philadelphia business community. At age 24, Falcone had positioned the company as a provider of office food delivery services.
The company began delivering breakfast items such as bagels, eggs, bacon, fruit, and juice to offices throughout Delaware and Center City Philadelphia. A partnership with the Wilmington-based iconic bakery Bagels & Donuts. They supplied fresh bagels daily, which quickly became popular items. Falcone estimated that the company was delivering between 6,000 - 8,000 bagels each week to offices and businesses. The bagel partnership was profitable for both parties due to consistent demand, adequate production capacity, efficient delivery routes, and leveraging the existing customer base from our grocery business
“Our customers want value and convenience,” Falcone said. “If we can save them time and aggravation, they’re willing to pay for it.”
Retail Delivery Experiments
Following the company’s early success, SDS expanded its pilot delivery programs with several major national retailers. These experiments explored whether a third-party delivery network could handle purchases from multiple stores. Among the retailers participating in early trials were Toys "R" Us, Blockbuster, Sears, Mail Boxes Etc. and a few others.
The company expanded its services to corporate clients such as DuPont and Conrail, offering delivery solutions for both office catering and retail orders. This model was inspired by an initiative originally implemented by PepsiCo, which provided on-campus locations for employees to pick up grocery orders—saving time and adding convenience.
Ahead of Its Time
In the end, SDS faced a challenge common to many early delivery startups: geography. While the company built a functioning delivery model, its base in Delaware and the surrounding region lacked the population density and venture capital ecosystem needed to support rapid expansion. Other early grocery-delivery companies, such as Peapod, benefited from launching in major metropolitan markets like Chicago, where a larger customer base and stronger investment networks helped accelerate growth.
Falcone’s business model also differed in a key way from many later delivery services. Rather than building and stocking its own warehouse, SDS operated directly from existing retail stores. Orders were fulfilled by shopping inside partner supermarkets and retailers, allowing the company to avoid the high cost of maintaining inventory and distribution facilities. This “shop-from-the-store” approach anticipated the model that would later be widely used by modern delivery platforms.
At the same time, the concept was operating well ahead of its technological moment. In the early 1990s, SDS worked without the advantages of smartphones, mobile apps, or GPS navigation. Orders were recorded on computers and transmitted by phone or fax, while drivers relied on printed directions and local knowledge.
Operating in a smaller regional market, SDS nevertheless proved the concept of outsourced retail delivery years before it became mainstream. Today, millions of consumers rely on digital platforms for grocery and restaurant delivery. Despite its limitations, SDS demonstrated the early viability of a model that would later grow into a multibillion-dollar global industry—though scaling the idea nationally would ultimately require the infrastructure, technology, and capital that the industry would only develop years later.