GoPuff delivery people scan the customers ID and verify it online instantly before handing over any alcohol. Director of Operations for Portland Jay Phung was making deliveries recently due to a driver shortage.

One of the instant delivery services in Portland now delivers alcohol.

Philadelphia-based goPuff launched here in August as a convenience store shopping experience you operate from your couch. GoPuff began delivering beer and wine in Portland on Dec. 12.

Customers can use the Apple or Android apps, or order from the website. Anyone buying alcohol must produce proof they are over 21 before the delivery person will hand it over.

There are 20 categories. Sections on the site have different names, such as IScream (ice cream is the most popular item ordered), GoFresh (fresh food) Party (red Solo cups, beer pong balls, “Friday the 13th” hockey masks), Essentials (laundry, spa, toiletries) and Munchies (candy, chips).

The new beer and wine section, which is greyed out outside the hours noon to 4:20 a.m., has been christened GoBooze. The selection is very average: just one dark beer (Blue Moon Cappuccino Stout), some semi craftsy IPAs (Lagunitas and Goose Island) as well as a raft of industrial lagers (Becks, Heineken, Corona, the Buds) and some ironic hipster ale (Rainier, PBR at 24 cans for $19.49).

The Business Tribune placed an order at around 12:15 p.m. and it arrived within half an hour.

At first delivery boy Jay Phung said he couldn’t talk because he had three more deliveries to make. But Phung proved happy to talk about his job. He drives his own car, and likes the flexible hours. He noted that he is head of operations at Portland goPuff, and was only hitting the streets because they are short of drivers.

Orders under $49 have a $1.95 delivery charge. There is space for a tip on the app screen. Phung said $2 or $3 dollars was standard. $5 was good.

Old Town base

GoPuff has a small warehouse at 414 N.W. 6th Ave., on the bus mall next to Harvey’s Comedy Club. Phung said he rated goPuff’s business model over that of say, PostMates, because the driver just picks up the order from the warehouse where pickers have assembled it. On PostMates, for example, the delivery person has to go buy the products, mostly restaurant food, on their way to delivery.

In Portland, Amazon Now for Prime subscribers offers two-hour delivery with a similar set up, although its warehouse in Northwest Portland is bigger and is served by more drivers. It covers similar ground — toiletries, snacks, small electronics — although Amazon Now also draws from New Seasons and Uwijimaya. Amazon Now offers a huge range of products — it’s the place to go when you really need a Chromebook, a Keurig machine or a copy of “The Girl on the Train.” You need to spend at least $30.

Phung has a degree in marketing from Portland State University and returned to Portland after working at a fishery startup on the coast when the founder died. He is the target market, but says on his deliveries he has seen all ages buying, from teens to people in their 70s.

GoPuff’s website claims it is “extremely popular among college students and Millennials, and has already attracted Snoop Dogg and players on the Philadelphia 76ers as customers, with revenue increasing 25 percent month-over-month.”

Raising capital to sell Rizlas

GoPuff closed its Series A round at $8.25 million in June 2016.

Founded in 2013 by Rafael Ilishayev and Yakir Gola, two Drexel University undergraduates, it first offered just 50 products. It now has 3,000.

With its hookahs, rolling papers, energy drinks and salty snacks the selection seems suited to the overlapping needs of students, Millennials and marijuana users. Perhaps now that it has alcohol it will attract a new customer base.

Portland’s hours are noon to 5 a.m., although some products vary. No alcohol is delivered before noon.

Phung said minors do try ordering beer then using the old line “Oh, I can’t find my ID. Can I have it anyway?” “We don’t let them have it,” he said.

22 minute average

Rafael Ilishayev, goPuff co-founder, told the Tribune the warehouse in Old Town was chosen after looking at three dozen other sites.

“There’s a 24 matrix set they use to decide, and based on that they decided on Sixth Avenue,” he said. “Amazon doesn’t do 30 minute delivery. Nationally our delivery average is 22 minutes, so it’s really, really important to be in the middle of the action.”

The site covers 3,000 items, give or take 250 items across different cities.

“Our supply chain team analyzes sales trends on a daily and weekly basis, so we are constantly discontinuing and introducing products so our customers get the right products and get a fresh feed of products.”

The warehouse in Portland can top out at 5,500 SKUs or items.

“We get thousands of tweets about goPuff every day, many about new products.” For example they have been asked a lot about Salt & Straw ice cream, a major Portland brand, so they are looking into stocking it.

“The bulk of the introductions come from customer requests.”

The company works with four dozen distributors across the U.S., such as UNFI and Core-Mark, and about 25 in Portland.

Ilishayev says if they do start selling Salt & Straw, distributors would bring them pints of ice cream two or three times a week. He says they don’t like to sit on inventory.

Asked about the very mainstream beer selection GoPuff offers in Portland, he promises, “In Portland we will support independent beers a lot more than we support national brands. We’re making that shift in Q1 of 2017 of introducing 100 to 150 local beers in Portland.”

“We’ve only been in Portland a short time, but as we bring in more local, craft brews, we expect Portland to really grow.”

GoPuff has been delivering beer and wine in Seattle since June 2016 and opened there in April 2016. “We launch a new city every three weeks so my recollection is becoming a little foggy,” he said. “Portland is growing at a faster rate than it was at this stage. We expect it to surpass Seattle eventually.”

GoPuff delivers hard liquor in some cities. “The licensing bodies are so much better on the west coast than they are in the east. It was a pleasure working with the OLCC.”

Is hard booze delivery coming to Oregon? “Until we have a full understanding of what we need to do with the OLCC, we don’t pull the trigger on it. But it is an idea, absolutely.”

It’s a three-step process to buy beer and wine, warning you about official IDs. The delivery person scans the ID by smart phone and it is instantly checked by goPuff’s partners Microblink and IDscan. If it is rejected the customer is hit with a 50 percent restocking fee. “The driver is incentivized to deliver because he is paid either way. The last thing we want is a wasted resource, wasting the driver’s time when he could be delivering for another customer.”

Drivers are paid every week. “Guys are leaving with three or four deliveries, so the first person gets their stuff in about 12 minutes.”

Every delivery should be within 0.2 of a mile of the previous one.

They just hired a new director of supply chain from Five Below, a “five dollar store” that is big on the east coast and is also based in Philadelphia.

They used to schedule deliveries manually until they were in six cities, then it got out of hand. Now it’s all done in real time on the cloud.

Move to Portland, drive for goPuff

The development or coding is built in-house. “There’s nothing open box, all out software is proprietary.” Server space is rented from Amazon Web Services.

He says goPuff is thinking of opening a west coast office. “We’ve been moving people from the west coast to the east, but it’d be easier to have a small tech team in Portland or Seattle. A lot of people have said the cost of living has become astronomical in the Bay Area, even if you are a highly paid developer.”

And the future?

“One of our most requested items are diapers and baby food. When we launched three years ago I’d never had thought we’d get into that. But the consumer’s growing up. Average age was 22 three years ago, now it’s 28. We’re a much different service than when we launched.”

So what next: golf balls and hair dye?

“I can’t say. Whatever the consumer wants, we’ll deliver. Our most important thing is being convenient, and offering products people want. We’re still scaling. We plan to be in 30 markets by the end of 2017. Suburbs are definitely not in the 12 month plan.”

jgallivan@pamplinmedia.com

goPuff

414 NW 6th Ave, Portland

http://gopuffportland.com