BENGALURU: In this age of home delivery — when anything from televisions, furniture, vegetables to cigarettes is dropped home — the milkman is not the only one to bring milk sachets to your doorstep.
Karnataka Milk Federation (KMF) has partnered with Mother Dairy to start ‘Nandini on Wheels’ service, with mini-trucks with milk products moving around, saving the citizen a walk to the milk booth. The pilot service will start in Yelahanka zone from Monday.
The signature blue-and-white vehicles will move around from 9am to 8pm, carrying sufficient stock. The vehicles also have a tie-up with the nearest parlour to get refills of stock as and when required. Though eight such mini-trucks are already moving around the city and state, they have been introduced by individual milk unions like Mandya, Bangalore Dairy, Mangaluru and others. Based on the success of the Yelahanka service, more mini-trucks will be introduced in other parts of Bengaluru and Karnataka, a senior KMF official told The New Indian Express.
There is already one vehicle in each district, being run on a trial basis. Raju, marketing manager, Mother Dairy, Yelahanka zone, said that ‘Nandini on Wheels’ is being introduced since there aren’t many milk parlours in Bengaluru, especially in the new areas. Though the contract is for one year, it will initially be run for three months and based on feedback, the service will be extended for a year.
There are 122 milk parlours in Bengaluru, and the plan is to add more and introduce mobile vehicles so that people are better connected to local products. Another reason for introducing these vehicles is that in most of the parlours, vendors are stocking few Nandini products and selling other items. The state government also plans to use these vehicles to supply other items, and based on the feedback, introduce similar vehicles to supply fruits and vegetables from Hopcoms.