Laing's Home Delivery Dock

[Geoff <Geoff@xxxxxxx>]

This was in the weekend's FT for those of you that don't read it[1] !
:-)

Geoff
[1] I only look at the pictures, honest!


On The Move - Anne Spackman
Home delivery at any time.

For all the convenience of ordering groceries or other goods online,
the one inconvenience is that you have to be there to receive them.
Some companies, such as Tesco, at least offer weekend delivery slots,
but my experience has been that they are always booked up so far in
advance that your food stocks run out before the delivery van arrives.

Now, a housebuilder has come up with a solution. Laing Homes has
developed a prototype 'home delivery dock", where goods can be
securely stored until their owner returns home.

At the moment you can only buy it as part of a =A31m package, with a
family house in Richmond thrown in. But the plan is to make the dock
available to any home-owner, whose property could be adapted to take
it.

The unit looks like a tall fridge-freezer made from brushed stainless
steel. It has three sections: one for frozen goods, one for chilled
goods and one for anything else, from boxes of cereal to mail order
clothes to bouquets of flowers.

The prototype unit is 1.6m deep, allowing several baskets to be stored
in each section. The baskets are linked, so the delivery man or
home-owner can pull each one through, without the need for unusually
long arms.

The dock's security system centres on a small electronic number pad on
the outside wall of the house. It is operated by a separate company,
Home Delivery Access (HDA).

Before placing an order, the homeowner calls HDA for an authorisation
code. When he makes the order, the code is passed on to the retailer.
The retailer, in turn, calls HDA with the number and the company
issues an authorisation code. The delivery man taps this code into the
electronic pad on the outside wall to gain access to the unit. Each
delivery has a different code for extra security.

Once the delivery has been made, a confirmation code appears on the
pad, so the retailer knows when the goods have arrived. This takes the
place of a customer signature. A modem passes this information back to
HDA, which can then inform the customer via e-mail or mobile phone
that their goods are waiting.

In the Richmond house, which is semi-detached, the dock is built into
an outside wall with access for the householder in the kitchen. Given
that the fridge and freezer sections can act as overflow storage space
for parties, this is probably the ideal place.

In an existing home it could be built into a garage or possibly take
the place of a cloakroom at the front of the house. Although the
prototype is very deep, Laing plans to customise the dock to suit
different needs.

Laing hopes mass production will bring the price down from the =A37,000
it cost to install the prototype to about =A31,000 per house. Initially,
the consumer will have to pay for the contract with HDA, but the plan
is to make retailers pay a subscription and activity charge instead.

The delivery dock was developed by Laing Homes innovations team. It is
equally innovative for a product developed by a UK housebuilder to be
offered to existing home-owners. If only a fourth section could be
developed, to take the plumber or telephone engineer, it would be the
answer to every householder's dreams.=20
www.laing-homes.co.uk  01908-209090.


-------------------------- eGroups Sponsor -------------------------~-~>
Restaurants, Movies, Weather, Traffic & More!
Call 1-800-555-TELL.  For more info visit:
http://click.egroups.com/1/9533/9/_/2065/_/971794852/
---------------------------------------------------------------------_->