Checkers Sixty60 sales now 40% the size of all of Woolies Food

The Shoprite Group this week finally revealed the scale of its dominant Sixty60 on-demand delivery service – and the numbers are astonishing.

In the last year (to the end of June), it sold R18.9 billion worth of groceries, liquor, and general merchandise through the platform, an increase of 48% on the prior year. It added the general merchandise category during the year, and also leveraged its thriving Petshop Science business by adding this specialist category into the app.

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This number – R19 billion – equates to close to 40% of the entire Woolworths Foods business, including its concessions which are its WCafés, coffee pods, and Now Now stores. A grocery delivery service. On motorbikes.

In recent years, the group has been focused on extending the reach and relevance of Checkers far more into higher income segments, as it battles Woolworths for a greater share of wallet. Its recent partnership with Discovery Vitality on HealthyFood, where Checkers displaced Pick n Pay as an alternate partner, has seen “strong gains” in its fresh foods category.

It somewhat downplays Sixty60’s success by saying it equates to 8.9% of its entire Supermarkets RSA unit’s sales.

Comparisons will be tricky going forward as its begun rolling out Sixty60 at selected Shoprite stores (around 19 stores), but this offer remains a tiny part (2%) of its broader on-demand delivery offering. The number will also include subscription revenue (the holy grail) of its Xtra Savings Plus offering (at R99 per month), which means customers that are likely to use and stick with the service for longer.

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A level of 8.9% across the entire Checkers, Shoprite, and Usave business is incredible, given that for Woolworths, online sales (including traditional online delivery and its Woolies Dash service) comprise just 6.6% of sales in its Food business, or R3.5 billion in the last year (effectively the same period as Shoprite).

This level of online sales – close to 10% – is definitely industry-leading (neither Pick n Pay nor Spar disclose these figures, but that are all but certainly well below 5%).

The Sixty60 contribution should be seen in the context of sales at all Checkers supermarkets and LiquorShops, which totalled R95.7 billion in the year (the Shoprite Sixty60 effort would’ve been well under 0.5% of sales from its inception in March). Of every R100 spent at Checkers by customers in the last year, over R19 was on Sixty60. That’s 20%!

Read: Why shoppers and suppliers need a strong Pick n Pay

At this level, its share of online sales in the increasingly core half of the group, which has been the growth engine for a number of years, is at least three times that of its closest rival Woolworths.

Comparing the sales volume of Sixty60 against a market capitalisation of a rival (like Pick n Pay or Spar) is about as useful as comparing a market capitalisation (value) to GDP (output). It really isn’t that useful.

Pick n Pay’s turnover for its last financial year (to end-February) was R76.3 billion – this does not include Boxer (R42.3 billion). Contrast this with Shoprite and Usave at R116.6 billion, Checkers at R95.7 billion, and Woolworths Food at R52.4 billion.

According to one data point shared by the group (using a Reveal Insights study in June, with a sample which represents higher-income households), Sixty60 has a “more than 80% market share of on-demand grocery delivery”.

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Shoprite says its average order value on Sixty60 and “margin mix” is higher than the average from in-store purchases.

Currently, it picks over one million products per day for deliveries, with a 97% stock fulfilment rate on orders and a 94% on-time delivery rate. With more orders, it is able to use this data for more optimised stock levels, ensuring that the right stock is in the right store at the right time.

General merchandise sales on the platform doubled in the last year, but this would’ve been off a relatively low base given the product selection in standard supermarkets (it added Checkers Hyper in October 2024).

The group cannot overstate the power of this omnichannel platform.

It says customers on Sixty60 are nearly four times more valuable than only in-store ones.

The Xtra Savings Plus subscription, it says, “drives stickiness”. Amazingly, it has an 85% retention rate of customers after their first order, versus a global average of something closer to 30%.

Beyond groceries, Shoprite claims that Sixty60 is now the largest digital commerce platform in the country. Takealot’s revenue (when converted to local currency) was R15 billion in the year to end March.

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Shoprite’s share price 

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