The two organisations are predicting that online sales will remain strong for the rest of this year, driven by rising fuel costs and falling disposable income, a desire to achieve sustainability in the supply chain, and smarter consumer shopping habits.

The two organisations are not claiming that online retail is immune to the credit crunch. They point out that a dip in growth for June (down 5 per cent) is significantly more pronounced than one in the same period of 2007. Online sales of electrical and similar higher-value goods are understood have seen a more marked slowdown.

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If you drive your car to the shops when you do your shopping, you need to buy 27 items to reduce your carbon emissions to the same level as buying one item online. And even if you go by bus, you need to buy nine items to maintain parity of emissions. The calculations assume that the carbon emission of each item bought online and delivered to the customer is just 132g of C02.

These are among the preliminary findings emerging from research by Heriot-Watt University, which is participating in a wider £2 million Government-sponsored project to investigate the relative environmental impact of online and conventional retailing. The findings were cited by Julia Edwards of Heriot-Watt during a ceremony held by IMRG to present its OLGAs (Online Green Awards).

At the same presentation, Julia Hailes, a sustainability consultant, said that if logistics companies could make better use of specified delivery time slots, some could make almost three times as many deliveries a day as major supermarkets achieve.

Tesco.com is introducing a vehicle tracking and telematics system to improve the efficiency of its grocery home delivery van fleet. It has chosen a system from Microlise, which is being rolled out to 1,500 vans working from 300 stores.

The company says the enhanced fleet visibility has already helped the company increase the number of deliveries it makes by 50,000 without increasing the number of vehicles on the road.

The Microlise GPS-based tracking units report on location vehicle and driver status plus vehicle performance, using the vehicles’ CANbus communications network to capture performance-related information.

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At the UKWA awards ceremony this summer, the “trade journalist of the year” winner was our own Peter Rowlands, co-founder and editor of Fulfilment & e.logistics, and editorial director of m.logistics. He is also responsible for the On Track & On Target newsletter.

UKWA is the United Kingdom Warehousing Association, and its membership includes many logistics and fulfilment companies, not just warehousing specialists.

The other prizewinners included Michael Brannigan and Son (best new member), CEVA Logistics (technology and innovation), The Bibby Academy (training award), Simarco International (team of the year). John Tombs of iForce was the warehouse person of the year, and Andrew Malcolm, chief executive of the Malcolm Group was presented with the chairman’s award.

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