Three years after launching its online grocery delivery business with big, well-funded plans, New York-based YourGrocer.com has run out of money and suspended deliveries.

YourGrocer.com, which was backed by Brand-Equity Ventures, called it quits as of Tuesday, November 27.

"For profitable operations, YourGrocer must double the number of its New York area customers. That requires $500,000 for marketing. We have been unable to raise the funds," Chief executive Maxwell Enock said in a note on the site and in e-mail updates.

YourGrocer started out as a 10-person operation in 1998 with ambitious plans to compete with the likes of Peapod, Webvan, HomeGrocer.com and other high-profile grocery delivery companies.

Early-stage investors such as Brand Equity Ventures believed the company could grab a share of the New York market by implementing a bulk-buying strategy and adding an online twist to the warehouse-shopping model. The plan was for customers to buy products in large, economical quantities from the Website, then the company's trucks would lumber along with the door-to-door deliveries.

In 1998, YourGrocer acquired NYCGrocery.com, for an undisclosed amount, a deal that the company said would boost its regular customer list to about 300.

But, in the end, the market just wasn't ripe enough to justify an additional investment, according to people familiar with the company's history, especially with marketing dollars so dear these days.

The shutdown of the Port Chester-based YourGrocer follows similar flameouts in the sector. In July, Foster City, Calif.-based Webvan ran out of gas and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

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Privately held North Brunswick, N.J.-based NetGrocer and Chicago-based Internet grocer Peapod are among the two remaining players in the space.