Is Sainsbury’s Following Uber’s Lead?

A couple of weeks ago we told you about Uber’s new program using eBikes to make deliveries for Uber Eats.

Now, Sainsbury's has launched the first UK trial of e-bikes for grocery deliveries, with a fleet of five electric cargo bikes hitting the streets of London. Customers in a three-mile radius of the Sainsbury's store in Streatham, South London ordering less than 275 lbs. of grocery are eligible for bike delivery. 

According to Sainsbury's, the 5 bikes will be able to deliver up to 100 orders a day, by making use of city cycle lanes to avoid traffic during peak times. They will also be able to park closer to customers' homes than is often possible for traditional delivery vans.  This effort also focuses in on what has become a major concern for grocers “the last mile.” 

Certainly for Uber Eats, Sainsbury’s and other grocers who operate in traffic congested cities like NYC, Chicago, San Francisco and the like, using these eBikes make a lot of sense and could dramatically shorten the now standard 2 hour window for grocery deliveries to say 30 minutes? Or at least 60 minutes which would open the floodgates for those over booked families who have resisted home delivery simply for not having a two-hour window available.