It is more efficient from an energy, carbon, land usage, and labor perspective.
The bluish-grey van that delivered my toothpaste had several hundred other deliveries on it, and the warehouse it came from stocks the products of hundreds of stores (if not more).
How do you think a tube of toothpaste gets to "Ye Olde Mum and Pop's Auntie Emma's Down Home Crunchy Granola Authentic and Real Indie Small Business"? Trucks.
> It is more efficient from an energy, carbon, land usage, and labor perspective
That's very doubtful. Normally you'd get toothpaste along with a bunch of other items. The convenience of delivery means you no longer purchase in batches. Batches is more efficient in every sense.
Maybe the mom and pop's supply chain could be shorter and more efficient, but the OP was talking about whether we should be going down the path of immediate delivery of small orders.
> How do you think a tube of toothpaste gets to "Ye Olde Mum and Pop's Auntie Emma's Down Home Crunchy Granola Authentic and Real Indie Small Business"? Trucks.
With one truck every two weeks that deliver toothpastes as boxes of 1000s. That’s one truck for all the customers that will go in that shop over two weeks.
Compare that to 2-3 trucks to directly deliver all these people one package per toothpaste. The only way to lower the delivery times is to increase the number of trucks.
Think of a tree where leaves are customers and the root is the producer. Each other node is an intermediary. In the worst case, if all customers go by foot in one shop that gets direct deliveries from the producer, you use only one truck (producer->shop). If all N customers are delivered by the producer, in the worst case, you use N trucks (producer->customer).
Yes.
It is more efficient from an energy, carbon, land usage, and labor perspective.
The bluish-grey van that delivered my toothpaste had several hundred other deliveries on it, and the warehouse it came from stocks the products of hundreds of stores (if not more).
How do you think a tube of toothpaste gets to "Ye Olde Mum and Pop's Auntie Emma's Down Home Crunchy Granola Authentic and Real Indie Small Business"? Trucks.