‘Instant’ grocery startup VOLY finally announces shutdown a week after stopping deliveries

A week after ceasing deliveries and deleting its social media accounts, grocery delivery startup VOLY has officially announced its closure.

Co-founder Thibault Henry made the announcement on LinkedIn on Friday morning, confirming what SmartCompany sources had revealed earlier in the week.

Henry pointed to the current economic climate and inflation as key reasons for the closure, with the startup finding it difficult to attract new investors.

“I am deeply saddened to announce that VOLY has stopped operating in Australia,” Henry wrote in the post, noting the company didn’t have enough runway to reach profitability.

“The sudden changes in macro environment, unstable geopolitics and high inflation have made it extremely difficult to attract new capital despite the support of our current investors.”

Henry went on to reflect on the past 18 months building VOLY, which he said were “full of hard work, passion, hope, tears, ups and downs, laughs and fun!”.

“Being the co-founder of such an ambitious project has been an honour and a privilege,” he said.

“Thank you to the entire VOLY Family!! It has been an absolute pleasure to work alongside you all. You should be bloody proud of what you have achieved! You are all extremely talented and amazing human beings!”

Henry also thanked VOLY’s 80,000 customers across Sydney and its investors.

“We did our best to delight you everyday and it was a privilege to serve you. Thank you to our trusted investors. You guys always showed us amazing mentorship and support during this wild ride!”

Despite securing $18 million in seed funding in December 2021, by June of this year VOLY had let go of half its staff and closed four distribution centres across Sydney. It also paused its plans to push into the Melbourne market.

The delivery startup also removed its 15-minute delivery guarantee, at the same time Milkrun removed its own ‘under 10 minutes’ promise.

Milkrun is now the only ‘instant’ grocery delivery app platform left in Sydney after SEND and Quicko folded earlier in the year.

This news also comes in the same week that Deliveroo announced that it’s leaving Australia.