I somewhat agree with you, but how many hours do those employees actually work? I was under the assumption they were paid by the job and not by the hour. The company is likely insulated since it's a service industry like Uber/Lyft drivers... They likely have so many employees because the market requires that kind of workforce to handle the number of orders divided by a part-time commitment by most of their workers. I'm sure there are some that spend countless hours picking groceries from shelves or using the curbside pickup networks to save time and snag orders.
When you think about the skillset it takes to use a picklist to grocery shop for people, and drive the groceries to their house....it likely doesn't even require high school education. Why do they deserve extended benefits (not being cruel here, but suggesting the business may not generate as much money as is required to provide those benefits without more tangible order requirements by Instantcart to pay for them) I'm not sure what instant-cart costs because I've not used them before, but have seen that they thrive most in markets where most people don't own cars. (ie. Big cities or resort cities where people are in condos/hotels with no rental vehicles) In both cases, people are willing to pay for the delivery fees because it's cheaper, more convenient, and possibly faster than renting a car or using public transportation. Of course, as I suggested with Kroger, there are many other competitors in the space, including Amazon. Prime Now and Whole Foods are taking a chunk out of the market, In-sourced delivery options and a greater curbside offering makes this a rocky place to invest. Unless you go with the companies that own the distribution too... Vertical integration is where it's at....that's also where employees will likely get more benefits if they want them.