Inthebag functional, but slow

Wooltru`s B2C grocery portal inthebag went live at the beginning of October. The site was co-designed by Logical, part of the Datatec group.

The site is in phase one of its roll-out, and as such only services selected areas in Gauteng and the Western Cape.

The site aims at being brightly attractive and cleanly laid out. Its signature colours are purple, green and orange, and these combined with high quality product images make for a very attractive site indeed. However, the text seems to be sprawled just about everywhere on the home page, and does not seem to be evenly distributed.

This lack of uniformity is more apparent lower down the page. Featured on the left side is a logo and clickthru to the Woolworths Web site. Right next to that is an indication of the various credit cards accepted by inthebag. If you glance too quickly at the seemingly grouped logos, you stand the chance of misinterpreting it as I did, thinking the site accepts Woolworths credit cards as well. In fact, it`s limited to Visa, Mastercard, American Express and Diners Club cards.

Working your way through this site is painfully slow - navigation bars to various shopper options and main sections are ever present, but navigation through the product categories is accomplished via a series of expandable lists which are clumsy and incredibly cumbersome. I found it rather annoying that I couldn`t hop backward or forward within categories... instead, if I found myself in the right category but wrong sub-category of products, I`d have to start from the anchored shopping list main menu all over again.

Inthebag offers users the standard shopping bag and account management options. Once you`ve placed an order through the site, you`re able to repeat that order the next time you shop.

There is also the option to toggle product images in order to allow pages to load faster - the lack of images actually improves the visual appearance of the pages. The site has a comprehensive help section that appears to cover all bases.

The shopping categories are relatively well populated, although there is generally a significant number of products listed as "temporarily out of stock". Inthebag carries both Woolies products and other branded products, and plans to eventually stock clothing, kitchenware, gifts and other consumer favourites.

The site also features meal planning tips and recipes.

The purchase process is simple enough - add products to your shopping bag, and when you`re ready, check out using the appropriate clickthru.

Delivery is promised Monday to Friday, on the day subsequent to the order being placed, between 8am and 10pm. Depending on the time of day you choose to have the goods delivered, expect to pay between R30 and R35 for delivery.

Bear in mind that inthebag currently delivers only to high density areas in Gauteng and the Western Cape. A detailed list of delivery areas can be found in the site`s help section, and if your area`s not included yet, there is the option of registering to receive notification when it is.