Just in Time Delivery

A good part of our whole way of living is dictated by the cost - in both money and time - of moving things around. The knock-on impacts are particularly interesting. We waste about a third of all the food that we buy in this country. Is it any surprise given that we typically buy a week or more in advance? We not only have to estimate how many portions we'll get out of, say a packet of salad but which night we'll eat it; who will be in for dinner; how hungry will they be; will we be late home and grab a takeaway instead and so on. Shopping online and having it delivered doesn't actually change this very much as there's a huge temptation to order just as far in advance. It's not just the free delivery which often means having to order £50 or so, it's the inconvenience of having to stay in to take delivery. No-one wants to do that every day.

This is exactly analogous to the problems industry faced until the last few decades. Huge stocks of components had to be kept on hand because if any one ran out, the production line would stop. When it took months to restock, the buffer level had to be enormous. When the pace of technological change grew to the point where - as with, for example, computer disk drives - anything more than a couple of months old was no longer the “leading edge” device it had been when it went into the stockroom, this situation became intolerable. The Japanese pioneered the concept of “Just in Time” delivery and manufacturing and everyone else had to follow in order to compete.

As well as dramatically reducing waste, responsiveness to customers has shot up over the last few decades - largely as a result of these techniques. The finely tuned logistics chain only became possible thanks to much more predictable and affordable shipping - thanks in turn to the introduction of the shipping container and the huge shake-up of the world's long-haul transport systems.

If we could order smaller amounts of food online and have them turn up without the hassle and cost, then we would switch to ordering only a day or two in advance. Less stock in the kitchen in turn leads to smaller fridges, possibly not even needing a freezer and certainly to far less wasted food. The same principle applied to our refuse and recycling would lead to better collection rates and less obtrusive - i.e. much smaller - bins.

Taking this one stage further, why couldn't we just order the exact quantity of ingredients we want for a meal? How hard could it be to let us click a button on our remote control and order the recipe Nigella is preparing - but with the quantities needed for the three of us that will be eating in tonight? This not only stops us having the other half of the salmon going off in the fridge, it encourages us to be more adventurous, to try new things and generally improve the variety in our diet.

There are actually a huge number of other things we could do if such a transport system were in place. Many of these haven't even been on anyone's radar because it would be daft to propose them on their own. If, however, we accept the premise that a consolidated transport service could deliver the low cost and high speed and quality of service necessary to deliver on the above, then it makes sense to exploit it to the full. Dozens of other opportunities become not only viable but highly desirable and readily achievable on the back of such a system.