Once you learn, you never forget. But cycling, having shaken off the yoke of the beasts of burden it replaced a century ago, and recovering from the detour it took for a spell as something simply to do for fun, is again coming full circle. That is to say, bicycling is no longer a recreational pastime; it's no longer greasy kid stuff. But this time, forgetting how to ride is the least of a modern cyclist's concerns. It's learning where to ride that can seem most challenging.

There are potholes. There's weather. And, of course, there's the somewhat suppressed chaos of traffic—both the horseless carriage variety and other bicycles.

But because, by nature, Portlanders are physically active and because Portlanders are politically active and because Portlanders are, well, Portlanders, bicycling is now part of the social landscape and the transportation infrastructure.

In the last two years, a few enterprising Portlanders have taken advantage of their city's endorsement of bicycle culture by forming new systems of bicycle delivery. They not only bring the market to you—they help alleviate the congestion and the smog that comes with it.

These very young bicycle delivery companies all seem to stem from environmentalism, an entreprenurial spirit and a sense of play. And they're serious about getting what people and businesses need and want delivered to them quickly, and often, more affordably than conventional transportation.

If you consider congested city blocks, streets and highways to be part of the problem, you can express it without the often too-cleverly worded bumpersticker activism by ridding yourself of the bumper altogether. But if you visit a Laughing Planet for a long lunch or buy a Pearl Bakery baguette from the Little Green Grocer, you might just be part of the solution, because these businesses and countless others like them in and around the city center have their goods delivered to them by bike.

B-Line

In March of last year, Franklin and Kathryn Racine-Jones and pedalers began delivering goods to Portland's urban core on electricity-assisted trikes. In those 10 months, they've been contracted to deliver goods (mostly foodstuffs) to over 100 close-in southeast and downtown destinations. This, says Franklin, frees companies from the logistical constraints (the sometimes sticky mess of traffic) of having to use trucks to deliver to downtown clients.

"Based on our research it makes sense for companies to focus on servicing very large accounts with large volume vehicles, but economically inefficient for those same trucks to serve small accounts," Franklin says. "Their costs are high for small accounts and partnering with B-Line makes sense not only from a sustainability and community point of view, but from a financial point of view as well. In essence, we provide the right tool for the job of distributing goods over that difficult, but vitally important, last mile."

According to Franklin, B-Line has delivered about 150,000 pounds of organic produce to the downtown core, eliminating about 2,000 truck deliveries. He estimates that B-Line has biked over 3,000 city miles to make deliveries to clients that would have once relied on delivery trucks.

Vitals
Franklin Racine-Jones on potential dangers of urban bicycle delivery: "The largest danger is maintaining hyper awareness of the other traffic (of all kinds). When that lapses there is the potential for an accident."

Clients
Organically Grown Company, Nature Bake/Dave's Killer Bread, Portland Roasting, Tao of Tea, Holy Kakow, Cyclone, SoupCycle

Delivery Hours of Operation
Mornings, 7 a.m.-11 a.m.; afternoons 2 p.m.-4 p.m.

Delivery Area
Close-in Southeast and Downtown Portland

Contact Information
surf: www.b-linepdx.com
email: info@b-linepdx.com
ring: 503.858.7141, or 503.858.7142

Soupcycle

In the midnight hours of Sunday nights, while most of the city sleeps, B-Line is pedaling the quiet streets to Jed Lazar and Shauna Lambert's kitchen to make sure they have everything they need for their upcoming week's delivery of salads, breads and homemade soups.

Seventeen months ago, Lazar and Lambert started SoupCycle, delivering fresh batches of soup to interested city dwellers, which at the time consisted of only their closest friends. But since then, things have moved rapidly along, keeping them busy in the kitchen and on the road.

"Since starting SoupCycle, our team of four has delivered over 10,000 pints of soup by bicycle," says Jed. "We're doing 275 deliveries each week, all by bicycle. In the next few months we'll start delivering three day a week (instead of two), and will expand Souplandistan (our delivery area) all the way out to 52nd Avenue and into parts of North Portland."

Mondays, he says, are 18-hour cooking marathons which, at the day's end, give them the soup they need for the week. Deliveries are made on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays.

"All told, we're biking over 100 miles a week. The rest of the week we cater events," Jed says, "and catch up on sleep." 

Jed says customers make orders primarily though their rather playful web site (aspiring soupetarians can make a soupscription if they live within delivery routes of Souplandistan), where they can order soups either vegan, veggie or meaty.

And with plenty of return customers, they've converted quite a few into soupetarians.

"We make our own tamari sauce and nutritional yeast dressing, and it's very popular," says Jed. "One customer, a vegetarian, told me that if our dressing was made with baby seal oil, she'd still eat it."

Vitals
Jed Lazar on potential dangers of urban bicycle delivery: "We're extremely cautious cyclists and we believe in harmony between cars and bikers. It can get a little hairy delivering soup downtown between the traffic and the winter rains, but Portland drivers are extremely respectful of cyclists, probably because many people who drive cars also bike. Without Portland's amazing bicycle infrastructure, companies like SoupCycle wouldn't be possible."

Clients/Delivery Area
The citizens of Souplandistan (swaths, sometimes rather large, of Northwest, Northeast, Southwest and Southeast Portland, with plans for a North Portland route in the works)

Delivery Hours of Operation
Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays

Contact Information
surf: www.soupcycle.com
email: yesplease@soupcycle.com
tweet: twitter.com/soupcycle
ring: 503.320.9610
 

Portland Pedal Power (PPP)

For those suffering from the board room blues (long meetings that extend so far into the lunch hour that it's impossible to walk down to a favorite food cart for quick bite), Portland Pedal Power (PPP) offers a solution. If you can't make it there, they'll bring it to you.

Last May, with some good business acumen and a savvy approach to the possibilities of Web 2.0 technology and techniques, PPP opened for business.

PPP's vice-president of operations, Jennifer Dederich says Portland Pedal Power's unique business concept is the "three-year brainchild of bike-commuting entrepreneur, Ken Wetherell," and it works something like this:

PPP charges the vendors to whom we provide service and we charge the end customer who orders product through our web site. Vendors pay an initial startup fee, a monthly hosting fee (on their web site) and a percentage of sales delivered through PPP. In exchange, PPP offers an online ordering system, on-call delivery service and social marketing services. The customers pay a delivery fee, and hopefully a tip, to the rider. We are able to keep these fees low because PPP doesn’t just make money from deliveries. While we are delivering, we are also promoting other business and running ads on our (delivery) enclosures.

Their six partners include Dederich, Ken Wetherell, Ben Rossiter (lead mechanic), Adam George (rider), Courtney Martin (chief financial officer), and Lee Ritter (web guru). Collectively, PPP's resources include marketing, sales, urban planning, finance, engineering, bike shop operations, web development and graphic design. But each of them at some point, takes the reins to make deliveries, often having two riders pull five-hour delivery shifts downtown.

Conceptually, if delivering by bicycle means carving out a niche for one's self, in the scheme of things, PPP is carving its niche, and then carving for itself niches out that.

Vitals
Jen Dederich on potential dangers of urban bicycle delivery: "The wind in downtown. If anyone has been downtown on a really windy day, you know that the gusts can come out of nowhere. On a PPP bike, the wind can really catch you and force you to move in ways that are not expected."

Clients
PK Thai in the Pearl, Peoples Sandwich of Portland, Wingnut Confections, Trailhead Coffee Roasters, 4th Avenue Shoe Repair, Little Green Grocer, countless (and a growing number of) food cart proprietors

Delivery Hours of Operation
Monday-Friday, 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; however, deliveries outside operations arranged by calling in advance

Delivery Area
Downtown Portland, Northwest, Pearl, Old Town-Chinatown, PSU, with plans to soon offer nighttime delivery to Downtown and the Northeast

Contact Information
surf: www.portlandpedalpower.com
email: info@portlandpedalpower.com
ring: 503.764.1415

View the slideshow for more images of bike delivery services in Portland, or visit our Flickr gallery:

Photos © 2010 Kenneth Aaron, Neighborhood Notes