Ikea has launched its first “low-carbon” delivery operation to customers in Paris on Wednesday, with products brought nearer by barge along the river Seine before making the final journey in electric vehicles.
"We are the first major retailer to deliver to our customers in this way and it is a first for the group as well,” said Emilie Carpels, project director for Ikea. The initiative is being tested for all Paris customers until the end of 2022.
The Swedish company plans to expand the river link, eventually opening a new river distribution centre in the port of Limay (Yvelines, west of Paris) in 2026.
On Tuesday evening, the first barge chartered by Ikea from Blue Line Logistics company left the distribution centre that the Swedish brand owns in Gennevilliers (Hauts-de-Seine, north-west Paris) to reach the port of Bercy, in inner Paris. The six 18m3 containers were then loaded onto the chassis of the electric vans that delivered to Parisian customers on Wednesday morning.
By January, Ikea is aiming for 35 containers to be unloaded each morning, making up a total of 455 orders per day. Online sales represent 20% of Ikea’s turnover in France, up from 10% in 2019.
The objective, according to the president of Ikea France Johan Laurell, is to deliver all of these customers by electric vehicles by 2025. Pierre Rabadan, deputy mayor of Paris with particular responsibility for the Seine, welcomed this operation, which “will help to relieve congestion on the streets of Paris.”
Ikea states that transporting goods by waterway between Gennevilliers and Paris will save 300,000 kilometres previously travelled by lorries every year.
