Staff Software Engineer, Instacart
Data Platform
$216-289k
Salary dependent on location + New hire equity grant
Online grocery marketplace & grocery tech platform
Open for applications
Online grocery marketplace & grocery tech platform
1001+ employees
Open for applications
$216-289k
Salary dependent on location + New hire equity grant
1001+ employees
Company mission
To create a world where everyone has access to the food they love and have more time to enjoy it together.
Role
Who you are
- Self-motivation and an enjoyment for a startup environment
- A strong sense of ownership
- Strong knowledge of common data infra technologies (Python, Scala, Kafka, Airflow, Spark, Iceberg, Delta Lake) in a production environment
- Strong knowledge of common industry datastores or warehouses (Postgres, ElasticSearch, Cassandra, Dynamo, Snowflake)
- An ability to balance a sense of urgency with shipping high quality and pragmatic solutions
- Experience working with a large codebase on a cross functional team
- Strong knowledge of SQL
- 10+ years of working experience in a similar field/environment
- Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, computer engineering, electrical engineering ORequivalent work experience
What the job involves
- Our backend systems power the clients used by millions of customers every year to buy their groceries online
- These systems must also support tight integration with the largest retailers in the US and Canada
- Engineering at Instacart provides the opportunity to work on challenging scaling problems while also designing the features that will define our industry
- You will learn how to build in an open collaborative environment serving millions of requests daily
- The Data Platform team provides a robust and cutting edge platform to process petabytes of data daily using industry best practices
- We work closely with Product/Data Science/ML teams to understand their needs and provide high quality solutions
- The team is still small and many of our bigger initiatives are at an early stage
- We expect you to work closely with stakeholders and shape these systems from design, technical decisions, project management to execution
- Your input will be critical for driving the Data Strategy and building the platform that Instacart data lake will be built upon
- Instacart's technology is constantly changing and adapting. Some of the technologies you would use at Instacart include: Scala, Python, Postgres, Snowflake, DeltaLake, Iceberg, Clickhouse, Spark, DBT, Flink Kafka, Airflow
- If you have experience with these technologies, you will have the opportunity to dive deeper
- If you haven't used these technologies you will have the chance to learn from the collective experience of our team
- You will work closely with other teams to understand their main pain points and translate them into self-serve and reliable solutions
- You are expected to mentor other team members and be a champion of engineering excellence
- You will be part of a small team, with a large amount of ownership and autonomy for managing things directly
- You will have the freedom to suggest and drive organization-wide initiatives
Our take
Instacart is an online grocery marketplace that operates a pick-up and delivery system in the US and Canada. Unlike standard grocery shopping, Instacart sends a “personal shopper” to your local store to buy your products, who then delivers them straight to your door on the same day via their own car. The company also supplies the Instacart Platform, with services for stores encompassing eCommerce, fulfilment, in-store, ads, and insights.
The increased modernization of society has meant more than ever that consumers are looking to buy their groceries online, making space for apps like Instacart to become daily life staples for years to come. Although the company must compete with other grocery store delivery services, such as Walmart’s own, it has expanded to cover large percentages of US and Canadian households, and is now aligned with over 900 retail banners across more than 75,000 locations.
Instacart's software offerings signify the company's focus on tech, designed to move it away from its dependence on the gig economy. To this end, the company has acquired FoodStorm, an order management system that powers end-to-end order-ahead and catering, integrating its technology into its enterprise suite. Despite an IPO in September 2023, market downturns have necessitated a 7% workforce cut in 2024, focused on middle management and creating a flatter organisational structure. With a new streamlined workforce, here's to hoping Instacart can maintain its momentum.
Steph
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
7% employee growth in 12 months
Company
Funding (last 2 of 14 rounds)
Nov 2021
$232m
LATE VC
Mar 2021
$265m
LATE VC
Total funding: $2.9bn
Company benefits
- Wellness Tailored to You: Medical, dental, vision, retirement, life & disability coverage right alongside physical & mental wellness programs, memberships and stipends to keep you and your family feeling your best.
- Family Building Benefits: No matter where you are in your family journey, we support you. Our plans cover modern family planning for all. We offer leave for all parents, flexible working schedules and an active Parents@ community.
- Work From Home Stipend: We help outfit your WFH setup and offer reimbursements so you can be your most productive while at home.
- Flexible Time Off: We all recharge differently. Take the time you need with our flexible time off policy and company-wide Self-Checkouts where we encourage everyone to sign off.
- Learning & Development: Whether you're just starting your career or leading teams, we provide customized L&D programs to help you grow and an annual allowance to pursue your development.
- Future Planning: We have you covered as you plan for your future. 401(k) matching in the US and RRSP in Canada, student loan assistance through Peanut Butter, free Rocket Lawyer membership, SoFi & First Republic financial planning and more.
- Four Year Fill-Up: We encourage our tenured employees to take longer breaks and truly unplug by doing something they love – typically four consecutive weeks around the four year mark.
- Community Connection: Support the communities you care about with volunteer weeks and get involved with our social impact program, Instacart Serves.
- Instacart Express Membership: We help keep your fridge stocked. Unlock grocery discounts with our Instacart Beta app while testing our latest features.
Company HQ
The East Cut, San Francisco, CA
Leadership
Apoorva Mehta
(Co-Founder & Chairman)Studied Electrical Engineering at University of Waterloo. Worked in Fulfillment Optimisation SDE at Amazon.com before going on to co-found Instacart.
Brandon Leonardo
(Co-Founder)Interned at Cisco Systems as an IT Engineer. Later became a Senior Web Developer at Webs and then a Venture Hacker at Angel List.
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