Supporting Milk & More With Their Modern Electric Fleet

The Client

Milk & More, part of the MoreCo Group, is the UK’s biggest online doorstep dairy delivery company, upholding the tradition of the great British milkman. 

The company operated a fleet of more than 1,000 milk floats and diesel vans, and in 2018 it further electrified, investing in 159 all-electric vans. Milk & More became the owner of the UK’s largest fleet of LDV V80 vans, supplied by SAIC Maxus via its dealer, Heathrow Maxus. The vehicles were a significant upgrade on Milk & More’s milk floats. The floats were low speed vehicles running on lead acid batteries, whereas the new vans were powered by lithium batteries with acceleration and top speeds to match the equivalent diesel vehicles. 

The business needed an Electric Vehicle (EV) charging provider to advise on, install and support a new network of charge points to support these electric vans. Heathrow Maxus recommended that Milk & More get in touch with Mer as a leader in this field.

The Solution 

Mer was a strong EV charging contender due to its fleet expertise and experience working with last mile delivery businesses. Initially, Milk & More believed it would require rapid chargers to support its new vans. However, working with their approved installation contractors, coupled with Mer’s design expertise, Mer helped Milk & More create a clearer picture of the vans’ charging requirements. As part of this process, Mer carried out an assessment of the LDV vans and their charging specifications along with a comprehensive survey of Milk & More’s depots. This helped demonstrate how fast charging could be more cost-effective than rapid chargers, without impacting Milk & More’s existing operations. Fast chargers can be at least 10% of the cost of a rapid charger, so this was an extremely important part of the project design.  

The vehicles are used overnight, meaning they are all back at the depots from 8am to 11pm every day. This enabled Mer to calculate that 7kW fast charge points would have the time to fully recharge each van, while also keeping each depot’s energy usage within its maximum capacity limits – breaching these limits can lead to costly surcharges from the local distribution network operator, so it was vital to avoid this.  

Reliability of the chargers is primordial for businesses like Milk & More to carry out their operations. Their fleet manager can monitor chargers’ health via the Mer Operator Portal, a back office system that also provides data on energy usage and savings on greenhouse gas emissions. The smart chargers can self-fix minor issues and if they can’t achieve this, it triggers an alert to both the fleet manager and Mer. Mer in-house engineers are equipped to deal with, issues that cannot be resolved online helping to minimise down-time. Milk & More chose Mer for their strong proposition with a clear emphasis on ensuring the reliability of the charging infrastructure. 

Phase one saw Mer provide 80 charge points for Milk & More’s, including at its  fulfilment centre in Greater London. The successful roll out was followed by 50 more chargers installed at various delivery hubs and depots including Oxford, Southampton, Bristol and Birmingham. 

Mer also helped Milk & More apply for the Workplace Charging Scheme grants, helping to reduce the overall costs of such a large-scale roll-out.

“They have been a partner of ours from the very beginning. The team had a clear understanding of the direction of our fleet strategy and provided us with invaluable information to get us started as we moved to our new fleet. From providing charging for our very first vehicles in 2018 through to supporting us with additional infrastructure as our fleet continues to grow, they have been an important part of our journey.”  – Mark Chapman, Electric Fleet support specialist at Milk & More