How to Do Your Grocery Shopping on Your Bicycle

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By Lilia Scott
eHow Community Member

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(5 Ratings)

Americans drive 84% of the time, even though most of our trips are less than 2 miles long. Why not ride your bike to do your errands instead? Biking is fun, saves money on a car, reduces stress, can save time if you would otherwise go to the gym for your exercise, burns about 500 calories per hour (think what you can eat!), and doesn’t pollute the environment. With a little advanced planning, you can carry your week’s groceries on your bicycle.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

Panniers
Comfortable bicycle seat
Backpack or courier bag
Bike trailer
Loose-fitting clothing
Secure bicycle lock
Spare tube or patch kit
Bungie cords
Helmet
Sturdy bicycle such as a mountain, hybrid or touring bicycle
Basket
Bike rack

Shopping on Your Bicycle

Step 1

Check with your doctor if there is any chance you aren’t healthy enough to ride a bicycle.
Step 2

Find a grocery store that you like close to your home. It also helps if the route to this store has bike or wide curb lanes and light traffic. A 10-mile distance is a good maximum if the terrain is flat and roadway pleasant.
Step 3

Chose a grocery store with good bicycle parking, and bring a lock. If your favorite store doesn’t have good bicycle parking, let them know that you want it and they might install some. You can also mention this to your local government or bicycle coalition, since they may be looking for locations to place bike racks.
Step 4

Check your tires—it will be easier to ride with a load on full tires.
Step 5

If it’s all the same to you, choose foods that travel well and are small and light. For example, buy juice concentrate instead of juice and tortillas instead of bread. But definitely don’t deny yourself something that you would otherwise want.
Step 6

Pack frozen foods together to keep them cold longer.
Step 7

Pack like a pro: You’ve probably noticed that baggers put the lighter, more fragile things at the top of the bag. When transporting food on a bicycle, this becomes even more important. You should not be using any of the bags provided at the store (other than just to separate things) because they’re not strong enough.
Step 8

If you are using a combination of loading up yourself (with a backpack or carrier bag) and your bike (with a rack or trailer), put the heavy things on your bike.
Step 9

Ride carefully. Take turns slowly. Signal your intention to drivers. You should do this anyway, but you will find your (and your bike’s) response time is slower when loaded down. Also, you don’t want to be all sweaty when you enter the grocery store’s compulsory climatization.
Step 10

Save large and heavy items (such as dog food or cases of wine) and some frozen items (if your distance is more than a few miles) for grocery trips with a taxi or car. Or ask if the store delivers.

Comments

yourbodycraves said

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on 4/10/2009 Excellent article. One of the best ways of doing grocery shopping.

iluvmnl said

on 3/21/2009 this is the one thing am begging to love and started doing it 3 weeks ago. i saved money for trips going to the market, grocery store, fast food and vet... aside from it there are side trips and exercise. yeah i need to buy a helmet :)