O iFood Pedal, the world's first exclusive bicycle rental service for couriers, completes two years of operation in October 2022. During this period, thousands of deliveries were made using this non-polluting mode in the six cities that offer this option (Brasília, Rio de Janeiro, Recife, Salvador, São Paulo and Porto Alegre).
In 2022, more than 18 thousand delivery men and women have already registered with iFood Pedal — out of a universe of 40 thousand who use bicycles to deliver via the app. “We want to accelerate the bicycle agenda in a responsible way”, says Fabiane Carrijo, Logistics Innovation coordinator at iFood.
The adoption of bicycles is important not only for iFood to fulfill its public commitment to make deliveries with at least 50% clean vehicles in 2025, as you already did with the help of Pedal in Rio de Janeiro. Using a bike to make deliveries is a way that many people find to earn their first income.
Therefore, the initiative emerged, in 2020, not only as a way to offer a non-polluting modal but also to facilitate access for everyone who wants to start making deliveries — based on iFood's observation that many of them were looking for this opportunity but they did not have a license to drive a motorcycle (or the resources to buy one).
“Several people used Tembici bicycles so they didn’t need to travel on their own bicycles to the expanded center, where there is a greater concentration of deliveries,” says Fabiane. “Sharing makes it easier to travel to these regions without the delivery person having to cycle long distances.”
In fact, it was in the capital of São Paulo that the iFood Pedal project began, with 500 bicycles, made available in partnership with Tembici, a leading micromobility company in Latin America. Currently, more than 2,500 electric bikes are available in the program.
Support points and Road Safety
iFood Pedal also offers delivery men and women support points to recharge their batteries while they work, a facility that can be found in almost all markets. “These are spaces where the delivery person can go to the bathroom, drink water or heat their meal in the microwave”, describes Fabiane. “They are generally away from home and like this type of support. It makes a difference in their daily lives.”
Delivery man Adriano, from São Paulo, uses the iFood Pedal and explains what it's like. “The support point works as follows: it opens at seven o'clock in the morning, there is an iFood employee who stays inside monitoring it, a little cafeteria. There’s a bathroom, there’s a place to heat your lunchbox,” he explains in one of the videos from the series Opening the Bag.
Education for traffic Safety is also part of the program. iFood Pedal cyclists participate in the Responsive Pedal, a WhatsApp course that has five classes, each lasting five minutes, on how to use a bike, safety when cycling, health care and communication during delivery.
In addition to online content, the Pedal Responsa course launched an in-person module with virtual reality (VR) glasses, creating an immersive narrative about day-to-day deliveries and reinforcing rights and care when cycling. The innovative experience was carried out in April this year at the São Paulo Support Point. More than 100 delivery men and women participated.
Thanks to all these new features, the iFood Pedal won the “Innovation of the Year” category in Mobility at the Estadão Mobilidade award in 2020. “The project is an incentive to micromobility in the city of São Paulo”, he told the newspaper Fernando Martins, head of logistics, innovation and engagement at iFood.
For Fabiane, iFood Pedal raised the level of bicycle use among delivery men and women who use the iFood app. “The project values the bicycle and places it as a protagonist in large centers,” he says. The idea now is to continue to climb this path. “We want to bring sustainable deliveries to more cities in the country.”
2 years of iFood Pedal
Thousands of deliveries made between 2020 and 2022 in 6 cities (Brasília, Rio de Janeiro, Recife, Salvador, São Paulo and Porto Alegre)
More than 18 thousand delivery men and women have already registered
2,500 electric bicycles
