Sainsbury’s has announced it is trialling the UK’s first electric cargo bike grocery delivery service. 

The trial is designed to assess whether the service could be rolled out to other areas across the UK as a ’greener’ delivery method for online grocery orders.

From this week, a fleet of five zero-emission bikes will begin delivering up to 100 online orders a day from the supermarket’s Streatham Common store. The bikes, purpose-built by e-cargobikes.com, will be able to deliver to homes within a three-mile radius of the site.

Sainsbury’s director of online Clodagh Moriarty said: “We’re delighted to be the first supermarket to trial grocery deliveries by electric cargo bikes. We’re always looking for new ways to make sure we can best serve our customers and this trial will help us explore whether there might be a more flexible way to deliver Sainsbury’s groceries to those who live in busy cities.”

Each cargo bike can hold up to 280 litres of product in the front and 130 litres at the back. The vehicles will also be able to use cycle lanes to avoid traffic and park closer to customers’ homes than traditional delivery vans. 

Once customers order their groceries online, Sainsbury’s will use routing technology to determine which orders should be delivered by a van driver or an electric cargo bike rider. 

James FitzGerald, md of e-cargobikes.com, added: “We’re thrilled to be working with Sainsbury’s on this trial. By taking existing e-cargobike technology and putting it to the test in a new market, we’re reimagining grocery deliveries and exploring a more sustainable transport system.”