By making back-to-school shopping easier, Instacart is also revealing its biggest hope—that the incentives it’s offering will convert trial shoppers into permanent members.

“This is the moment in the year when everyone takes a fresh start and stocks up their cabinets,” Jones said. “The patterns that people establish then can last a whole year long.”

Perhaps. Retail analyst and author Bruce Winder is skeptical that a back-to-school incentive—even if gets some shoppers to buy a yearlong membership—will result in long-term loyalty.

“Instacart is in a brutal fight to try and maintain revenue as grocery delivery has softened post-pandemic and other providers like Uber Eats have used membership as both a revenue source and a forced loyalty program,” Winder said. “I have a hard time seeing how back-to-school fits well with their efforts.”

Winder added that titanic retailers such as Walmart, Target and Amazon already have a firm grip on back-to-school shopping. On July 6, Walmart began tagging school supplies with last year’s prices. Target is selling items like notebooks, markers and glue for 50 cents. And Amazon will reward shoppers who spend $40 on back-to-school items with a 20% discount.

Jones denies that the current campaign is any sort of response to “competitive dynamics” and believes that short-term incentives can and will create long-term loyalists.

“That’s the whole idea of integrating the limited-time offer with the idea of getting people into patterns,” she said. “We’re [telling them] here’s an offer and if you like this, we’ve got you all year long.”