Direct Delivered Produce (DDP) Ltd has begun using a local eco-bike service for second deliveries and Director Paul Grimshaw believes they could be a bigger part of his service in years to come.

The bikes and their riders are supplied by ‘Ecofleet’, which offers a zero emission delivery service on cargo bikes into London and DDP was introduced by Cross River Partnership (CRP), a non-profit and impartial partnership organisation that aims to “work with its partners to address the grand challenges of our time and shape the London of tomorrow”.

“They initially approached us with the idea of doing first deliveries, but we found that it would be more practical to use the bikes for second deliveries,” said Paul. “There’s more traffic on the road between 8am and 11am than during the hours we make our first deliveries and if our vehicles are stuck in traffic, they take longer, they are less efficient and they naturally create more emissions.

“With all the road and bridge and road widening that has been going on in London recently, the eco-bikes have proved extremely effective. They can carry up to 40 kilos, take the quickest route available to our customers and there are zero emissions. We’ve not been using them more than a few times a week to date, but if we have made a mistake or one of our customers has forgotten to order we can put things right more efficiently and with less impact on the environment.

“They certainly haven’t let us down so far,” Paul added. “The drivers are all polite, they are careful with the produce and they keep track of everything they are doing.

“The majority of our customers are within a seven-mile radius of here, so it works well for them. I think it will become a more important service for us as traffic in London returns to full capacity. We are always trying to do things that will offset our carbon footprint and although we can’t drastically change the way we deliver product at the moment, we’re waiting for the technology to develop to allow us to do more.”