This delivery model is once again popular on French soil, thanks to digital technology.
The company Le Fourgon – which employs this 29-year-old delivery driver from Tourquen – offers several daily delivery slots, which can be booked online by geographical area.
On his smartphone, Corentin must then follow an optimized route according to the different stopping points, in a reduced time and perimeter.
This young shoot, barely a year old, highlights the "zero waste" associated with "zero constraints": customers receive their cases of drinks in exchange for empty containers from their previous order.
A concept that particularly appeals to families.
This Tuesday, at La Chapelle d'Armentières, Olivier Gaillegue is replenishing his stocks of whole milk and apple juice.
Five people at home is "too much plastic" and "trash cans that overflow quickly", explains the fifty-year-old.
"Besides, it's not more expensive than the drive", adds this man previously accustomed to taking his car for heavy and bulky races.
The young shoot from Lille claims 85% of its offer at supermarket prices, not to mention the deposit of around five euros per case of twelve bottles.
Many products – juice, milk, mineral water, beer, etc. – come from the region or from nearby Belgium, where the deposit rules.
But Le Fourgon also offers consumer brands, on which it is however not able to be cheaper than the supermarkets.
Delivery by rounds was formerly practiced by brewers or dairymen before being undermined by the arrival of single-use plastic packaging, preferred to the reuse deposit.
Its revival in peri-urban areas does not compete with the ultra-fast delivery offers – “quick commerce” – which are developing in the centers of large cities.
Why now ?
The ecological question is more at the heart of the concerns, and the digital "optimizes the delivery and the logistics of a system which has already proven itself", estimates the expert in consumption Philippe Goetzmann.
A deliverer of recorded drinks, May 3, 2022 in Haubourdin, in the suburbs of Lille Denis Charlet AFP
But this economic model can only work over short distances including local players who practice deposit in order to maintain a virtuous carbon footprint.
– Reduced costs –
The Van has attracted nearly 7,000 customers in France in one year, with six delivery hubs serving Lille, Dunkirk, several towns in the mining area, Nantes, then soon Amiens and Rennes.
According to Clément Génelot, distribution specialist at Bryan, Garnier & Co, the business model of the tour allows him "to be profitable before the others", by reducing delivery costs.
The "quick trade", or the classic delivery of the large distribution, must on the contrary amortize higher costs.
A deliverer of recorded drinks, May 3, 2022 in Haubourdin, in the suburbs of Lille Denis Charlet AFP
Paris ?
"Not in our strategy", affirms Charles Christory, one of the three co-founders of Le Fourgon: traffic and parking problems would disrupt the fluidity of the rounds.
A good calculation, according to Clément Génelot, who advises these new players to avoid "the Île-de-France or Rhône-Alpes regions, soon to be attacked by big players like Picnic".
This Dutch company had adapted the model of the tour in its country of origin, before extending it to Germany and the north of France, but with an offer worthy of a supermarket, ranging from fresh products to products from hygiene.
She is boxing in another category, with a billion euros in turnover in 2021, which she intends to "double in 2022", according to Grégoire Borgoltz, head of Picnic's expansion in France.
Players similar to Le Fourgon are budding in France, such as Le Marché Moderne in Lille, and La Tournée.
Launched at the end of 2021, the latter serves eighteen rather well-to-do towns in the west of the capital and offers organic supermarket-type drinks, but also laundry detergent, with the aim of expanding its offer in the future.
© 2022 AFP