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The investigation from Consumer Reports and Groundwork Collaborative, a progressive policy group, found that some identical products were priced differently from one customer to the next—sometimes by as much as 23%.
Instacart has been using a shady AI algorithm that charges different prices to different customers on the same grocery items in the same stores without telling them, according to an explosive study released by Consumer Reports and Groundwork Collaborative earlier this week.
Members of Congress “were displeased, shocked, engaged and ready to consider legislative and oversight action,” Lindsay Owens, executive director of consumer advocacy group Groundwork Collaborative told The Post on Thursday, after meeting with 15 lawmakers.
The study from nonprofits Groundwork Collaborative and Consumer Reports followed more than 400 shoppers in four cities and found that Instacart sometimes offered as many as five different sales prices for the exact same item, at the same store and on the same day.
“Instacart is quietly running pricing experiments on millions of shoppers during the worst grocery affordability crisis in a generation, and it’s costing households as much as $1200 a year,” said Lindsey Owens, executive director at Groundwork Collaborative. “They have turned the simple act of buying groceries into a high-tech game of pricing roulette.”
The Federal Reserve today announced it will cut the federal funds rate by 25 basis points to a range of 3.5% to 3.75%.
A new analysis of an annual gift guide from New York magazine shows that key holiday items this year are 26% more expensive on average versus 2024, according to Groundwork Collaborative, a nonprofit consumer advocate.
Instacart shares fell after a report accused the company, also known as Maplebear, of charging different prices for the same items. The stock was down 6% to $43.47 in Wednesday morning trading. Shares are up 5% this year. The report, led by Consumer Reports, progressive think tank Groundwork Collaborative, and progressive media outlet More Perfect Union, said the San Francisco grocery-delivery company displayed several different prices for users who added the same item from the same store at the same time.
A small case study from Groundwork Collaborative and Consumer Reports looked at nearly 200 grocery shoppers in four U.S. cities that went on the app Instacart and shopped for the same products at the same time.
An investigation from Consumer Reports and Groundwork Collaborative revealed Tuesday that Instacart displayed different prices on the same household staples sold at well-known stores, including Albertsons, Costco, Kroger, Safeway and Target. The report said customers are “unknowingly part of widespread AI-enabled experiments.”