Horizontal collaboration: enablers and barriers in the last- mile delivery for e-grocery

In the recent years, e-grocery has been growing globally, accordingly raising logistics challenges. Among them, last-mile delivery is one of the most impactful activities in the online order fulfilment from both an economic and environmental perspective dealing with small orders and dispersed destinations (at final consumers’ homes).In this context, horizontal collaboration (i.e. collaboration between companies at the same level of the supply chain, for example for resource sharing) is a chance to increase efficiency and reduce the environmental impact of last-mile logistics. In line with the call made by scholars for further investigations of logistics innovations from a network perspective, the objective of this study is to identify success and failure factors to the implementation of horizontal collaboration for e-grocery, considering the perspective of different stakeholders. A multiple exploratory case study has been developed: data is collected combining secondary sources, face to face interviews and phone interviews with retailers and logistics operators, to guarantee triangulation. Interviewees highlighted potential benefits, including efficient routing and increasing vehicle saturation; however, to successfully implement a collaborative approach there is the need to overcome existing barriers, for example strong competition among retailers. Building on existing literature, this work discusses factors affecting collaboration, and classifies them as supply chain related or market related ones. This study offers insights to both academics and practitioners. On the academic side, it develops a structured classification of enablers and barriers to horizontal collaboration for e-grocery. On the managerial side, it provides a thorough analysis from the perspective of different actors suggesting directions for innovative collaborative solutions to achieve economic and environmental sustainability for the whole network.