Dark Grocery Store Vs. Micro Fulfillment Center: Which is Leading E-Grocery?

With the rise of online shopping and home delivery, many supermarkets have turned to a dark grocery store as a solution for fulfilling digital orders.

However, these facilities can be costly and geographically limiting — arguably the biggest challenges in online grocery business. That's why some opt for a micro fulfillment center (MFC).

This innovative approach to e-grocery delivery and takeaway is revolutionizing the industry by providing a more efficient and cost-effective alternative.

In this article, we'll explore how MFCs are slowly inching their way over dark grocery stores in the grocery fulfillment race.

Understanding the Dark Grocery Store Concept

The urgency to adopt such models is underscored by global market trends. The global online grocery market is projected to surge from USD 401.8 billion in 2025 to USD 3,950.7 billion by 2035, at a CAGR of 25.1% between 2025-2035.

In the U.S., online grocery sales have grown 27–28% year-on-year, with pickup methods (curbside, in-store) representing the majority of online grocery volume. These figures demonstrate why grocery retailers are rapidly investing in fulfillment-first models like dark stores.

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Dark grocery stores are not a new concept in the ecommerce landscape. Amazon has been using them as fulfillment centers in different regions of the country and around the world. Essentially, these are large warehouses where supermarkets stock inventory and fulfill online grocery orders.

Unlike their traditional brick-and-mortar counterparts, dark grocery stores are not open to the public. Instead, they are solely focused on delivery.

The concept arose as a response to the increasing demand for online grocery shopping and the corresponding need for efficient inventory management, order fulfillment, and optimized delivery orchestration.

Because retail stores are neither built nor equipped to fulfill online orders, grocery operators found it necessitated a separate structure altogether.

While they filled in the gap, dark grocery stores did come with their own challenges, such as high costs and limitations on location. Thus, retail businesses started looking for cheaper options nearer to customers to offer faster delivery.

The rise of micro fulfillment centers

Recognizing the new and lucrative opportunity, existing physical stores and small-scale warehouses located in densely populated urban areas grabbed it. And the MFC business model was born.

Micro fulfillment centers (MFCs) are compact, tech-driven facilities often embedded within or near urban stores. They’re designed to automate and speed up the picking process for online grocery orders, reducing the distance between inventory and customers.

Micro fulfillment centers offer numerous advantages for online grocery businesses:

1. By utilizing these established locations, retail companies can tap into an already efficient supply chain, reducing costs and streamlining operations.
2. This approach also helps startup online grocery stores leverage the infrastructure and resources of an existing supply chain supermarket.
3. Retail chain operators can expand their reach and provide customers with convenient delivery and pickup options.
4. Being near the end consumer minimizes last-mile delivery costs and meets their same-day delivery demands.
5. Without checkout lines and catering to individual shoppers, higher volumes of orders can be fulfilled.

Recent data shows that online grocery is growing nearly 9% CAGR, compared to just 1.7% for traditional grocery. Analysts expect online to represent nearly 17% of all grocery sales by 2029.

This growth is being fueled by the demand for speed and flexibility, making MFCs a strong complement or alternative to dark stores.

Technology’s role in MFCs

To guarantee profitability, scalability, and sustainability in this digital age, adopting and applying technology is a must for any business. MFCs are no exception.

Automation and speed are the strengths that MFCs gain from technology, which they pass on to their retail clientele, such as integration with existing systems for efficient fulfillment.

Various providers are also poised to contribute to the efficiency of MFCs. For instance, the Hy-Vee grocery chain aims to conquer the Midwestern micro fulfillment market by commissioning Takeoff Technologies.

Smart order picking is where the real difference lies—from aisle mapping to multi-order workflows, the right picking tool powers both dark stores and MFCs with speed and accuracy.

Other holistic grocery solutions providers, such as Wave Grocery, have also helped streamline how supermarkets and online grocery stores operate.

In June 2025 alone, U.S. online grocery sales reached $9.8 billion, with pickup channels outperforming ship-to-home. This highlights how critical it is for retailers to invest in picking systems that can keep up with surging order volumes. Solutions like the Wave Grocery Picker App address this by combining scanning, substitution logic, and performance monitoring to reduce errors and save time.

Wave Grocery not only offers to create a web and mobile app, but also a delivery app, picking app, phone ordering software, and loyalty software for that seamless online grocery experience.

Note: Whether you’re using robotics or traditional picking, inefficiencies in picking are often the bottleneck. That’s why solutions like the Wave Grocery Picker App, with aisle-based product mapping, AI-driven substitutions, real-time scanning, and multi-order batching, make both fulfillment models far more scalable and reliable.

The future of retail with micro fulfillment centers

The future of grocery retail is hybrid — combining dark stores, MFCs, and customer-facing formats like curbside and in-store pickup. Retail giants are already moving in this direction:

• Amazon is expanding same-day grocery delivery to 2,300 U.S. cities by the end of 2025, challenging Walmart (32% share) with its own 22.6% market share.
• Walmart continues to dominate online grocery volume through its expansive pickup network.
• Target has ramped up its grocery logistics with new distribution centers, supporting a 31% online grocery growth in early 2025.

These moves underscore that micro-fulfillment is not just a trend but a competitive necessity. For regional and mid-sized grocers, leveraging fulfillment technology., particularly tools that make picking faster and more accurate, is the most practical way to compete.

The MFC market size will likewise grow by 12 times in the same year with a value of $2 billion.

Final thoughts

As ecommerce continues to dominate the retail industry, it looks like the future of e-grocery lies in the hands of micro fulfillment centers.

These innovative hubs are transforming the way consumers shop online for groceries with faster fulfillment. At the same time, they are enabling retail businesses to thrive in their ultra-competitive space.

Whether you pursue dark stores or MFCs, success depends on your ability to pick and prepare orders efficiently. With the online grocery market set to multiply in size over the next decade, fulfillment-first strategies supported by tools like the Wave Grocery Picker App will separate the winners from the laggards.

For many years, Wave Grocery has supported MFCs — an example being the Kritikos supermarket chain in Greece, whose online shop and mobile app we built.

In our experience, integrating our apps and various e-grocery software with our fulfillment capabilities can take your bottom line and business growth to new heights.