Urquhart, R orcid.org/0000-0003-1640-2947, Newing, A orcid.org/0000-0002-3222-6640, Hood, N orcid.org/0000-0002-2084-2155 et al. (1 more author) (2022) Last-Mile Capacity Constraints in Online Grocery Fulfilment in Great Britain. Journal of Theoretical and Applied Electronic Commerce Research, 17 (2). pp. 636-651. ISSN 0718-1876
Abstract
Forecast growth in e-commerce home-delivery demand provides retailers with opportunities for expansion and increased levels of investment. To maximise these growth opportunities, retailers face operational and logistical challenges related to order fulfilment and the last mile. In contrast to other sectors, many grocers operate a store-based delivery model rather than a separate distribution channel. Under this model, orders are picked from store shelves and store-based fleets of delivery vehicles are used for last-mile fulfilment (delivery to the consumers’ home). With very rare access to commercial data from Sainsbury’s, the second largest grocer in Great Britain, we analyse the geographical variations of online groceries fulfilment capacity at store, region, and rural–urban geography levels, exploring the interrelated impact of capacity constraints related to storage and delivery in limiting the further growth of these services. The spatial extent of delivery service areas are found to considerably vary between stores and the existing store network presents barriers to further capacity expansion in some regions. We argue factors associated with the last mile are an important capacity constraint/enabler in the e-groceries sector and suggest that the effective expansion of these services requires further research into online service area delineation to maximise delivery efficiency and capacity. The approach used here is readily transferable to other online service delivery providers in both GB and elsewhere.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2022 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Environment (Leeds) > School of Geography (Leeds) > Centre for Spatial Analysis & Policy (Leeds) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 04 Jul 2022 13:57 |
Last Modified: | 04 Jul 2022 13:57 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | MDPI |
Identification Number: | 10.3390/jtaer17020033 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:188175 |