Meal kit service Blue Apron is trying something a little different: letting you buy your own protein and produce.
The meal kit service is launching a new scaled-back version of its service with Walmart’s Jet.com. Called “Knick Knacks,” the kit will come with all the sauces, spices, grains, and dairy needed to make a two-person meal, and will require customers to pick up any required meat or produce on their own.
The company announced the new product on its quarterly conference call this week. By removing the meat and produce from the kits, Blue Apron is able to extend shelf life. The company expects similar profit margins for the Knick Knacks kits to what it sees with its traditional meal kits, CNBC reports.
While Jet is an online retailer, Blue Apron says the trimmed-down kits could also potentially work well at brick-and-mortar retailers as well. The idea was actually born out of its partnership with Costco.
Blue Apron announced a loss of 12 cents per share on Wednesday, 5 cents less than analysts had predicted. The company says it had a total of 557,000 customers in the fourth quarter with an average revenue per customer of $252. In December, it announced a partnership with Weight Watchers to deliver meal kits based on Weight Watchers recipes.
