Drone Girl’s first drone delivery: what it’s like shopping from Walmart with a Wing drone

For over a decade, I’ve been chronicling the drone industry’s evolution. But believe it or not, I only just experienced my first (real) drone delivery.

I headed to Texas, which is quickly become the land of drone delivery. So much so, that industry experts are calling it the Drone Star State. There, multiple drone delivery companies including Wing, Flytrex, Amazon, Manna, Zipline and DroneUp are all vying for a slice of the drone delivery pie. Some are in early testing phases, while others, like Wing, are fully operational with real customers.

And that’s exactly what I set out to experience — a real, drone delivery. Come with me to experience my first ever, real drone delivery. And if you want the video version of this experience, check it out on my YouTube channel!

Drone Girl’s history of drone deliveries

Now, I’ve definitely knocked drone deliveries in the past for being mere publicity stunts. And yes, that including Wing itself (way back in 2016). At the time, I criticized them for massively overhyping a curated test project sending Chipotle burritos over merely a single field to students at Virginia Tech. I equated it to a science fair project.

I’ve also personally participated in some test drone deliveries previously. For example, I emceed an event in 2015 on the football field of Harvard for their Making Robotics Fly event, held in tandem with Harvard Business School. There, I helped Matternet put on a demonstration of a t-shirt delivery to the stadium.

But since then, drone delivery has evolved from one-off stunt to serious operations. For example, just six months after crossing the milestone of making 100,000 delivery drone flights, Wing in March 2022 clocked in a new milestone of 200,000 commercial drone deliveries made in its company history. Zipline, which is considered the largest drone delivery company in the world, marked its milestone one million drone deliveries in April 2024.

It was clear: drones were delivering for real customers, and I wanted to be one of them.

Behind-the-scenes at a Wing Nest in Forth Worth

I reached out to the folks at Wing to see if they could help make my drone delivery dreams come true.

Wing runs drone delivery operations in a few spots around the world, including Logan and Melbourne, Australia. Then, there are the deliveries with Walmart occurring at a handful of stores in Dallas Fort-Worth, Texas. Since Australia was a bit out of reach, I set my sights on Texas.

Wing delivers to eligible home addresses within a specific radius of participating Walmart stores that have a safe package release zone (e.g. no full forests of towering trees!). Since I wasn’t a Texas homeowner, Wing found me a suitable grassy patch near a Fort Worth Walmart. After all, I also wanted a tour of their “Nest” – the designated area where drones are loaded, take off, and land.

So with that, I made my way to Walmart, first for a Nest tour and then for my actual first drone delivery.

What the Wing Nest is like

The Wing Nest is an airport of sorts, but it’s hardly that. It’s really just an area blocked off via a chain-link fence. That space takes up a small chunk of the Walmart parking lot.

At other retailers, like the Logan Mall in Australia, the “Nest” sits on the mall’s rooftop. They could also theoretically sit in any other outdoor space, like a privately-owned parcel adjacent to a store. Nests can vary in size, ranging from a few parking spaces to many more. It’s all dependent on how many drone landing pads are needed, based on demand (and the retailer’s preferences).

At the Fort Worth Nest, two rows of drones are laid out on pads, ready to take off when an ordered is made. On the far side sits a single shipping container, which stores backup drones and other supplies. A power generator keeps everything charged.

At this site, the whole operation is executed through a combination of Walmart employees and Wing employees. Walmart employees physically walk to store shelves and get them packed up, bringing them out to a parking lot. But Wing also has an employee onsite who handles the drones.

Separately, Wing staffs employees who work across a handful of Nests in the region to deal with things like maintenance. Then, Wing also operates a Remote Operations Center in the Dallas area. This is sort of like its air traffic control tower. Though operations are fully automated, Wing still employs staff here to serve as a second set of eyes (looking through a computer). They consider factors like winds, weather or traffic. Many of these employees have backgrounds in traditional, crewed aviation.

What placing a Walmart drone delivery order is like

As of June 2024, customers place their orders directly through the Walmart app. Upon selecting their address (and assuming the address is approved), customers can navigate to a screen displaying items eligible for delivery.

Sure, they can always select traditional methods like in-store pickup or delivery on wheels. But should they select drone delivery, they’ll be able to pick certain items. The drones can only carry packages weighing up to about 2.5 pounds, so there’s a natural limitation there. A Wing employee told me that one of their most popular orders is limes. Presumably, people making margaritas forgot a key ingredient. The quick nature of drone delivery can ship it before the house guests have even arrived.

Besides a weight limit, there’s also a size limit. Drones carry boxes designed specifically to fit in the aircraft, so large items won’t work, no matter how light they are. For example, I thought about ordering a dozen eggs. However, the Walmart app only gave me the option for a six-pack (I’m guessing the long, dozen-carton shape wouldn’t fit in the box).

Upon selecting your delivery item, you check out as you’d normally expect. That means entering your credit card number for payment.

The app keeps you up-to-date in real time, displaying your order status, which includes a map of where the drone is and a clock giving ongoing estimates of the arrival.

The drone’s flight

Once you place an order, a Walmart order packs it, using items from the store shelves. The employee then brings that box out to the Nest, where a person secures it to the aircraft. Then, the drone chooses a “best route” — and that route is almost never the same. That “best” route takes into account factors like wind, which contributes to why it’s different every time.

Wing drones can fly a roundtrip distance of up to 12 miles.

Upon arrival at your home (or in my case, my temporarily-adopted park home), the aircraft gently lowers your order down via its tether and unclips the item for you. Wing recommends you wait until the package fully detaches, upon which you can grab it.

My first drone delivery experience with Wing

Texas heat called for a refreshing beverage, so I ordered a Powerade for my first drone delivery. It arrived in a speedy 10 minutes, considering the short distance.

To test the system’s limits, I followed up with a slightly more “challenging” order – a glass jar of Alfredo sauce. Thankfully, the jar arrived intact, thanks to the slow and controlled release from the tether.

I spent about an hour on a Friday morning at Wing’s Nest at a Fort Worth Walmart store. That said, I saw only a couple orders placed from customers who weren’t me. Meanwhile, the Walmart store itself was actually pretty busy with customers packing shopping carts.

Wing drones have a strict weight limit. Someone stocking up for groceries for the week ahead, or for supplies for a big party, wouldn’t benefit from drone delivery. It’s more for those one-off items, like the last-minute, forgotten limes.

Will more people use drone delivery?

Drone delivery has especially powerful use cases in situations like emergency medical deliveries, where medication or other supplies needs to be shipped quickly (and doesn’t take up a lot of space). Wing is testing that very thing in Ireland.

The Powerade I ordered was nice on this hot, Dallas day. The Alfredo sauce was a fun party trick. With that, I’m curious to see how sustainable these operations are.

For what it’s worth, I’ve talked to regular people who rely on drone delivery on a nearly-daily basis. One customer, an elderly woman with vision issues who is unable to drive, found drone delivery to be far more convenient than navigating a physical retail store (let alone getting there). Another guy who worked from home (and out of walking distance of any restaurants or cafes) told me he ordered his lunch via drone 3-4x a week. He said his alternative was a delivery service like DoorDash. Since he felt obligated to tip a human driver, he said drone delivery netted out cheaper.

It could be a hit especially during the holidays. A Wing survey of 1,000 U.S. consumers found that 74% of consumers are interested in saving time running holiday errands with near-instant delivery. A drone allows you to skip the trip to the store, which can be especially stress-relieving during the busy holiday season.

Customers are also particularly interested in faster deliveries. Because drones aren’t even contingent upon human delivery drivers, drone delivery has a potential leg up on other types of online ordering. Wing surveyed 5,000 consumers nationwide as part of its 2024 State of Grocery Shopping and Delivery report.

The report found that 84% of shoppers expect their grocery orders to arrive within the same day. What’s more, 30% want delivery within the hour. And yes, they truly are willing to pay for it. 76% of survey respondents said they’d pay more to have their order within 30 minutes or less.

And here’s something else that’s promising for the future off drone delivery.A higher than average rate, 83% of Gen Z survey respondents, said they would pay more for ultra-fast deliveries. Older generations have more patience, presumably.

What’s next for Wing and Texas drone deliveries?

Wing, alongside the other drone delivery players in Texas, says it intends to continue its growth trajectory. In fact, an estimated 75% of the Dallas-Fort Worth metro will have access to drone delivery by the end of 2024 via Walmart and its drone delivery partners alone. 

Much of that growth can be attributed to a July 2024 approval from the Federal Aviation Administration. With that, the FAA authorized both Wing and Zipline to conduct commercial drone flights without visual observers in the same Dallas-area airspace. That’s a first for U.S. aviation.

Wing itself continues to iterate on its software and hardware. We continuously see new prototype aircraft coming out of Wing. Its also experimented with new mechanisms, like its Autoloader hardware and its Wing Delivery Network software system.

Walmart is definitely crushing the space — and so is Wing. (It’s certainly not Amazon.)

Time will tell how regulatory approvals go — and if it’s commercially viable beyond fun stunt to try a few times. I enjoyed my Powerade delivered via drone, and I eagerly await the next one.

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