Instacart Faces FTC Scrutiny Over AI-Driven Grocery Pricing Tests

New updates have been reported about Instacart (PC:INSCV)

Instacart has come under formal scrutiny from the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, which has issued a civil investigative demand focused on the company’s AI-enabled pricing tool acquired through Eversight. The inquiry follows research indicating that Instacart shoppers have been charged meaningfully different prices for the same grocery items at the same stores, with some paying as much as 23% more, raising concerns about potential algorithmic price discrimination at a time of heightened consumer sensitivity to food inflation. While the FTC’s action does not allege wrongdoing, it signals regulatory concern that AI-based price testing in an essential category like groceries may unfairly burden certain consumers and could have implications for Instacart’s pricing practices, retailer relationships, and broader regulatory risk profile. The investigation fits into a wider policy focus on data-driven and algorithmic pricing across digital platforms, bringing Instacart into the center of a high-visibility debate over fairness, transparency, and the appropriate use of AI in consumer markets.

Instacart is pushing back, emphasizing that its retail partners, not Instacart, ultimately control shelf prices and that the company aims to align online and in-store prices wherever feasible. A company spokesperson stated that the program at issue is not dynamic or surge pricing and does not adjust prices in real time based on supply, demand, or user-specific data; instead, Instacart characterizes the practice as randomized A/B testing akin to traditional in-store price experiments. The company insists it does not use personal, demographic, or behavioral data at the individual user level to set prices, which, if validated, could mitigate regulatory and reputational risk but will be tested by the FTC’s review. For executives and investors, the key implications include potential compliance costs, possible constraints on future AI-based pricing innovation, reputational exposure if public trust erodes around grocery affordability, and the likelihood that regulators will expect greater transparency and safeguards around any data-driven pricing tools used on the platform.