Walmart expands grocery delivery

The path to fast and affordable online grocery service is littered with obstacles: refrigeration challenges, storage woes and high transportation costs, among others. But the country’s largest retailers are convinced that it leads to a lucrative and largely untapped market. And they are all rushing to establish dominance first.

On Wednesday, Walmart escalated the competition by announcing plans to expand its online grocery delivery service to 100 metropolitan areas by the end of the year, with orders fulfilled at more than 800 stores nationwide and shuttled to shoppers by drivers contracted through Uber, Deliv and other ride and delivery contractors. Customers must order at least $30 worth of goods and pay a delivery fee of $9.95; they can receive their purchases in as little as four hours if they order by 1 p.m.

The move puts the world’s largest retailer on a direct collision course with the world’s most powerful e-commerce player, Amazon, which purchased the Whole Foods grocery chain for $13.4 billion last summer and recently announced plans to use those stores to service on-demand orders.

Ford recalls 1.4M vehicles

Ford Motor Co. announced a safety recall for 1.4 million of its cars in North America on Wednesday, saying that because of issues with the steering wheel bolts, the steering wheel could detach.

It also announced a safety recall for about 6,000 manual-transmission cars over a clutch-plate problem that carries a risk of fire.

The recall over the steering wheel problem applies to 2014-18 Ford Fusion and Lincoln MKZ vehicles.

— Bulletin wire reports