Authors: Simone Pettigrew, Leon Booth, Victoria Farrar, Branislava Godic, Charles Karl, Julie Brown, Jason Thompson
Categories: Special Section: Drinking in the home, alcohol, autonomous vehicle, home delivery, policy, regulation, Original Paper
Source: Drug and Alcohol Review
Doi: 10.1111/dar.13574
The emergence of autonomous vehicles (AV) heralds new methods of alcohol delivery that are likely to have substantial implications for home drinking. The aim of this study was to explore the factors that have the potential to hasten or restrict widescale increases in alcohol availability resulting from AVs.
Thirty‐six interviews were conducted with 44 stakeholders across diverse sectors. Interviewees discussed their perceptions of how AVs will evolve and the implications for alcohol access. The interview transcripts were analysed to develop a typology of factors that need to be addressed to minimise harms associated with greater home alcohol consumption due to AVs.
The interviewees identified a range of demand‐side (e.g., enhanced convenience for consumers) and supply‐side (e.g., increased efficiency for providers) factors associated with AV home deliveries that could increase the prevalence and volume of home drinking. A third category of factors related to potential forms of suggested harm‐minimisation options related to appropriate enhancements of licensing restrictions and responsible service requirements and the use of various fiscal levers to introduce price barriers.
The suggested strategies will require collaborative efforts across government and non‐government organisations to address the potential issues arising from the advent of AV alcohol deliveries. Technological and policy solutions will be needed to ensure responsible service of alcohol. This study provides policy makers with insights into forms of intervention that may be required to minimise the harms associated with the use of AVs in alcohol home delivery systems.
Keywords: alcohol, autonomous vehicle, home delivery, policy, regulation
Home drinking requires alcoholic beverages (or the ingredients thereof) to be brought into the home. COVID‐19 has exacerbated a pre‐existing trend towards ‘on‐demand’ delivery of alcoholic beverages via services such as Uber Eats and Jimmy Brings [1, 2, 3]. This is of concern given the home delivery of alcohol has been linked with greater access to alcohol by minors and may be more common among heavy/problem drinkers [4, 5, 6]. In addition, some users of such services have reported that they would have ceased drinking had the service not been available [6]. Another consideration is that restrictions that can apply in public contexts (e.g., responsible service requirements) do not apply in the home [7].
The emergence of autonomous vehicles (AV) (also known as driverless vehicles) has the potential to consolidate and amplify the harms associated with alcohol home deliveries by enabling even faster, cheaper product deliveries [8]. Foresight and proactive intervention are needed to ensure appropriate policies and practices are implemented to minimise any potential negative impacts of this technology. The speed with which new mobility options can become embedded is evident in the successful introduction of ride‐hailing services in many countries [9]. The aim of this study was to contribute to this nascent area of research by exploring factors that have the potential to hasten or restrict widescale increases in alcohol availability and home drinking resulting from the emergence of AVs.
AVs represent an important public health intervention due to the lives that can be saved through crash avoidance, emissions reduction, enhanced mobility for people with disabilities, and safer commuting environments for pedestrians and cyclists [10, 11]. There are thousands of AV trials taking place around the world, including in the form of cars, trucks, vans, shuttles, trains, buses, trams, ships, drones, robots and sidewalk bots [12]. In Australia, examples include the ‘Advanced Connected Vehicles Victoria’ and ‘How Automated Vehicles will Interact with Road Infrastructure’ (Queensland) trials [13], and drone‐delivered coffee and food trials are also well underway [14]. To date there has been some recognition that the emergence of AVs will have implications for alcohol consumption, but the discussion has been largely confined to the domain of drink driving and the potential downward effects on rates of alcohol‐related crashes but overall increased intake due to liberation from driving [15, 16].
In terms of passenger vehicle applications, the emergence of AVs is happening gradually through the increasing sophistication of features in new vehicles that remove or supplement control by human drivers [17]. By comparison, autonomous delivery vehicle technology is likely to occur in a more disruptive fashion due to rapidly growing ecommerce applications and the economic gains available from driverless transport options [18]. For example, AV freight logistics is a burgeoning area of applied and academic research [19], and fast‐food companies are making substantial investments in drone and robot delivery applications in an effort to reduce the costs associated with human‐reliant home delivery systems [12, 20]. Trials to date demonstrate that consumers' exposure to AV deliveries substantially increases acceptance of this means of product distribution [21].
As a consequence of developments in autonomous home deliveries, current trends towards more online orders and the reduction in bricks and mortar retail premises are expected to intensify [22]. While this has positive potential outcomes, such as improving access for those with mobility limitations (e.g., the elderly and people with disabilities) and reducing disease transmission in pandemic times [22, 23], the implications for alcohol‐related harms at a population level could be substantial due to increased alcohol availability and reduced cost [8].
This combination of positive and negative potential consequences requires careful management to optimise outcomes, but very limited data are currently available to guide policy decisions and regulatory framework development [19, 24]. The aim of the present exploratory study was therefore to assist in addressing this research gap by investigating the likely impacts of AV technology on alcohol deliveries and the policy and regulatory approaches that may be needed to minimise associated harms.
This study was part of a larger project on the potential social and health‐related impacts of AVs, including their likely impact on urban design and the availability of a range of unhealthy products. Thirty‐six semi‐structured interviews were conducted with 44 stakeholders representing a range of relevant sectors to explore the likely scenarios under which alcohol home deliveries could be facilitated by AVs. The interviewees represented government departments (n = 27), non‐government organisations (NGOs: n = 2), private sector companies and associated peak bodies (n = 11), and academia (n = 4). These organisations covered the following transport, health, planning/infrastructure, telecommunications, defence, alcohol regulation, environment, agriculture, engineering and insurance. Five interviews were conducted with multiple stakeholders to enable multiple employees from the same entity to attend, and the remainder were individual interviews (see Table S1, Supporting Information, for a list of interview attributes).
Due to the need to interview individuals with specialist knowledge, participant recruitment occurred through a process of selective identification that involved accessing the networks of the author team, conducting web searches to identify key personnel in relevant organisations, and asking interviewees to nominate other individuals with relevant expertise (i.e., snowball sampling) [25]. Ethical approval for the study was granted by a University Human Research Ethics Committee and all interviewees provided informed consent.
During the interviews, stakeholders were asked to discuss the advent of AVs and the implications for alcohol (and other harmful product) deliveries according to their specific area of expertise. For example, transport specialists were asked to discuss emerging technological capabilities and then invited to turn their minds to how these could affect home alcohol deliveries, while alcohol harm‐reduction specialists were initially asked to describe existing trends in alcohol home delivery and then encouraged to consider how vehicle automation could impact on these trends. The list of general topics used to guide the interviews is provided in Data S1.
The average interview length was 67 min (range 38–122 min). The interview transcripts were imported into NVivo 12 qualitative data management software for coding and analysis. An inductive, iterative process was used involving open and selective coding [26]. This entailed using NVivo's search functions to identify text relating to alcohol, followed by line‐by‐line coding of the relevant sections of the transcripts. NVivo ‘nodes’ were progressively created to develop an emergent coding hierarchy based on issues identified in the transcripts and related concepts in the literature. This emergent process necessitated the use of a single coder (author Simone Pettigrew), which is an appropriate analytical approach when the objective is to yield new insights rather than testing a pre‐existing theoretical framework [27].
The analysis yielded the typology depicted in Table 1. The interviewed stakeholders noted that once widely available, AV alcohol deliveries could provide distinct and substantial demand‐ and supply‐side advantages that are likely to assure widescale adoption by consumers and producers alike. This was regarded as a poor outcome in the context of alcohol provision due to the harms associated with more accessible and affordable alcohol products. Interviewees suggested a range of regulatory approaches to minimise any harms that could result from AV alcohol home deliveries. The nominated demand‐ and supply‐side factors and regulatory options are outlined below, with example quotes provided (clarifying text added in italics).
There was general agreement among interviewees that the enhanced convenience and affordability of autonomous alcohol delivery services would provide a natural impetus for extensive community uptake.
A partial exception to a perceived general acceptance among consumers of alcohol delivered via AVs was the case of drone deliveries. While the convenience benefit was understood to be a major drawcard, issues such as noise and invasion of privacy were raised as potential concerns that could dampen consumer enthusiasm and acceptance.
Concerns about the implications of increased accessibility and affordability were especially pronounced among those working in health‐related areas, but were also evident among those in other sectors such as transport and
Various characteristics of AVs were described as making them attractive to alcohol companies. In the first instance, the ability to rely on computer programming and the removal of human drivers were seen to offer the potential for enhanced efficiency and reduced operational costs.
Overall, the value proposition offered by AVs was considered to be too great for industry to
However, it was acknowledged that similar to other technology‐based distribution systems (e.g., Amazon, Uber), there are likely to be substantial development costs in the early years that would preclude participation by smaller operators in the short
The availability of ‘big data’ was recognised to be an important enabler and motivator for industry uptake of AV deliveries. It can facilitate customer‐initiated purchase interactions in the form of enabling online sales and associated identification/recognition of customers at the point of delivery. Even greater value may lie in the ability of alcohol companies to use captured data to effectively reach out to customers at the most promising times and places in the form of vendor‐initiated interactions. For example, an interviewee explained how it would be possible for autonomous delivery vehicles to arrive unsolicited using accumulated data on individuals' behaviours and
The interviewees discussed a range of regulatory issues that need to be resolved to ensure the emergence of AV alcohol home delivery is not accompanied by exacerbated alcohol harms. These issues primarily related to alcohol licensing restrictions, responsible service requirements, fiscal levers and monitoring and enforcement. It was noted that these same issues are relevant to various current social trends that are already challenging for regulators, such as a growing reliance on online ordering for both planned and impromptu purchases, heightened expectations of convenience resulting from the evolution of the gig economy, and more home drinking due to COVID. Concern was expressed that adding AV alcohol deliveries to the mix could prove highly problematic given current regulatory contexts and capabilities.
Restricting licensing was viewed by some to be key to minimising harms in a future characterised by the widespread use of AVs for alcohol deliveries. This could involve two main (i) placing time restrictions on deliveries (e.g., minimum 2 h between ordering and delivery or setting a curfew); and (ii) maintaining current requirements for premises to have a fixed address and not granting licences to roving alcohol AVs that make unsolicited approaches to potential customers. However, some interviewees did not hold out much hope that regulators would be able to ultimately withstand pressures for ‘progress’.
Existing responsible service requirements were viewed as being partially relevant to AV alcohol home deliveries to the extent that it was assumed that alcohol marketers would continue to be obligated to avoid supplying to minors and intoxicated drinkers. This involves age checking, examining the social environment of the purchaser (for secondary supply potential) and assessing inebriation. Identity verification and inebriation detection issues were deemed to be resolvable with technological solutions, potentially representing an improvement on the current subjectivity involved in human assessments of such criteria. However, other aspects of responsible service were considered more challenging if there is no human driver at the point of delivery.
Even stakeholders with a stated preference for minimal government interference in the market acknowledged the important role of regulation in protecting young people from alcohol delivered to the home autonomously.
Support for harm‐reduction regulation for AVs extended to taxing unhealthy products such as alcohol.
Despite general agreement about the need for various approaches to addressing the potential harms associated with on‐demand AV alcohol provision to people's homes, the design, implementation, and enforcement of effective regulatory frameworks was thought to be impeded by a lack of access to relevant data. This was acknowledged to be an existing problem that will be amplified once AVs are in wide use.
Autonomous delivery vehicles are emerging, and AVs are likely to constitute a prevalent method of alcohol home delivery in the future due to compelling demand‐ and supply‐side benefits. It is important to understand how this development may exacerbate existing trends towards online ordering and home drinking that have been stoked by the growth of the home delivery gig economy and COVID's relaxed alcohol supply laws [7, 28, 29]. The interview data suggest alcohol availability will be expanded through fast and cheap home delivery systems featuring a suite of autonomous transport options (e.g., vans, trucks, shuttles, drones and street bots). Such a scenario is of concern given the harms associated with home drinking and therefore the need to address the home as a consumption context as a matter of priority [7].
The regulatory issues raised by interviewees were largely consistent with those identified in previous research as being important considerations in the development of online ordering and home delivery regulations (i.e., regardless of whether the delivery forms include a human driver or not) [1, 2]. This suggests the advent of AVs will represent an extension of current trends rather than being a completely new set of circumstances for regulators to address, albeit with added complexities for elements involving greater subjectivity (e.g., estimating the likelihood of secondary supply according to the social characteristics of the delivery context). However, a key consideration is the overall effect on the quantity of alcohol consumed in the home (and in total) once these trends align. The rapid emergence and large‐scale infiltration of Uber is an example of how highly convenient, affordable transport options can permeate the market at a speed that catches regulators unawares [9].
To prevent AV alcohol home deliveries exacerbating alcohol‐related harms, the study findings indicate that coordination will be required across a range of entities. In particular, within government there is a need for communication and coordination between alcohol regulators and departments responsible for health, transport and infrastructure. For example, decisions regarding the provision of alcohol licences to roving AVs would ideally be informed by consideration of implications for community health and well‐being, traffic congestion and urban planning (e.g., the locations of proposed re‐stocking warehouses). In addition, monitoring and compliance processes for any emerging regulation will require cross‐agency co‐ordination. This represents a challenging situation in the context of existing licensing processes already exhibiting uneasy engagement between relevant entities [30]. For instance, local governments attempting to restrict or prevent the granting of new alcohol licences have frequently had decisions overturned due to industry appeals and regulatory bodies prioritising commercial interests over health‐related concerns [31, 32]. The potential need to include transport agencies in decision‐making increases the level of complexity.
The primary limitation of this study was the qualitative approach that involved engagement with a modest sample of purposively recruited stakeholders across diverse sectors. The results should therefore be considered exploratory and in need of further confirmatory research. A second limitation was the requirement for interviewees to anticipate future trends that have yet to emerge, although this was ameliorated to some extent by including individuals with relevant expertise. Third, the Australian context means the findings may not be transferrable to the situations in other countries. Future research could focus on further exploring the likely impacts of autonomous alcohol home delivery systems on when, where, and how alcohol is consumed and the implications for effective strategies to minimise harms associated with home drinking.
In conclusion, AV home deliveries are set to change the way people access alcohol, yet the implications for home drinking have yet to be adequately appreciated. Current regulatory systems are not prepared for this change; early planning is needed to ensure action is taken before system lock‐in occurs and the AV delivery genie is let out of the bottle, never to be returned.
Each author certifies that their contribution to this work meets the standards of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors.
This study was funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council, Grant Number APP2002905. Jason Thompson receives salary support from the Australian Research Council (DECRA Fellowship DE180101411). Branislava Godic receives an Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarship.
None to declare.
Open access publishing facilitated by the University of New South Wales, as part of the Wiley ‐ University of New South Wales agreement via the Council of Australian University Librarians.
Pettigrew S, Booth L, Farrar V, Godic B, Karl C, Brown J, et al. Expert stakeholders' views on the potential nature and impacts of autonomous alcohol home delivery. Drug Alcohol Rev. 2023;42(5):996–1003. 10.1111/dar.13574