Woolworths’ dark store secret
Woolworths says it can’t yet disclose further details about the rollout of dark stores that support its on-demand delivery service, Woolies Dash.
Dark stores aren’t open to the public and are dedicated to fulfilling online orders. The retailer launched its first dark store, located in Cape Town’s CBD, in August 2024.
“We’re not ready to talk about new developments in the Dark Store space just yet,” Woolworths told MyBroadband.
In October 2024, the retailer said its first dark store, which serves on-demand delivery customers in the city bowl and surrounding areas, was proving successful.
It said the facility had helped it significantly improve efficiency and offer more delivery slots in the area.
At the time, a spokesperson told MyBroadband that the retailer planned to launch new dark stores and hoped to announce its next one soon.
“The introduction of our first dark store in the Cape Town CBD, servicing the city bowl and surrounding areas, has been a big success,” the spokesperson said.
They added that the space and format are geared to online picking, and Woolworths’ online team can scale to increased demand more easily.
The spokesperson said the dark store enables Woolworths to offer a full product catalogue to a larger group of customers.
“We can put more order volumes through a store where we don’t compete with in-store shoppers for either aisle space or product availability,” they said.
“These improvements have contributed to Dash growing by 71% in the last financial year.”
In its announcement introducing the Cape Town CBD dark store, Woolworths said it significantly improved product availability for online orders in the area.
It explained that Woolies Dash orders are usually fulfilled through local Woolworths outlets. This means that online orders compete with in-store shoppers.
“The dark store eliminates this competition, and customers enjoy quicker delivery, thanks to a dedicated environment designed to be online-first,” the retailer said.
Ultimately, it wants to roll out Woolies Dask dark stores across the country to support the on-demand delivery service.
“Investing in dark stores is a testament to our focus on creating a future-fit omnichannel offering that leverages and transforms existing assets to continuously improve our customer experience,” said Woolworths online and mobile director Liz Hillock.
Strong online sales growth driven by Woolies Dash
Woolworths launched Woolies Dash in December 2020, trialling the service in 18 stores in Cape Town, Durban, and Johannesburg. The on-demand delivery service has shown strong growth in recent years.
The retailer’s financial results for the 2025 financial year showed continued online sales growth, with a significant contribution coming from Woolies Dash.
In the 52 weeks ending 29 June 2025, Woolworths’ overall online sales reached R7.78 billion, representing 8.9% growth over the same period last year.
Woolies Dash turnover increased by 41.6%. This helped bump the proportion of online sales in Woolworth’s food category to 6.6%.
Online food sales grew 32.9% and contributed a significant R3.33 billion in turnover to the total online sales.
This followed strong online sales growth in the previous financial year, when Woolies Dash also led the charge for the company.
Woolworths attributed the online sales growth to increased penetration of the Woolies Dash service, which grew by 71.2% in the financial year.
Overall, online food sales increased by 52.8%, accounting for 5.5% of the retailer’s total sales in South Africa.
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