Overview
At present there is relatively little publicly available data about home shopping and delivery. Public and private data that is currently collected is often not compatible in terms of the units of measure used (for example, different organisations measure deliveries in tonnes, number of items delivered, and number of delivery addresses, making data comparison and synthesis impossible). The type of data most required to achieve a better understanding of home deliveries is likely to include:
- consumer preference data about issues such as the types of home delivery systems that are most favoured, the most preferred delivery times and days, and the amount that customers are prepared to pay for different levels of home delivery customer service;
- operating cost data for different home delivery options and systems;
- growth forecasts for the home delivery of different categories of product;
- trip generation data for home deliveries and effects on passenger transport of home shopping and delivery;
- environmental impact data concerning the effects of different home delivery options, and information about the comparative environmental impact of traditional shopping versus home shopping and delivery.
Consideration also needs to be given as to how best to collect the necessary data. Publicly available data of this type would help to facilitate better evaluation and decision-making with respect to home deliveries by companies and policy makers.
To determine which data needs to be collected in order to improve understanding, operational efficiency and policy considerations about home delivery. Consideration should also be given to data collection methodologies.