Retail shopping and the last mile transport: past, present and future transformations

Research Project, 2018 – 2019

This project focus on retailing and the so-called last mile transport of the supply chain, i.e. the transport of goods from the point of acquisition (e.g. the store) to point of consumption (e.g. consumer homes). How these activities are carried out has great impact on the transport system and the sustainability impact of the supply chain. Today the great majority of these transports are conducted by the consumers themselves, mainly by using the car. This is partly a result of a significant transformation during the last decades towards an increasing number of shopping centres. On the one hand, a concentration of retail stores to shopping centres leads to increase in transport efficiency to the stores but on the other hand it leads to longer distances between the store and consumer homes. However, recent developments concerning digitalization in retailing also mean that such transports are increasingly conducted by others than consumers, such as the retailers or third parties with new business models. So far it is not clear what this means for the transport systems more generally, i.e. if it adds to or reduces the number of transports. Both these lines of development are important to investigate to be able to understand the transition of transport systems in the past, present and the future. The overall purpose of this project is to understand how the last mile transport in retailing shapes and is in turn shaped by the transport system and its transformation in the past, present and the future.