BÄKO Ost eG is a cooperative that accompanies the traditional craft on its way into the future. Two electric cars will be tested over the next eight weeks - also in order to be able to report on them to the member businesses. Together with ENSO Energie Sachsen Ost AG (renamed SachsenEnergie AG on 01.01.2021), BÄKO Ost eG will be gathering further experience with an electric car over the next eight weeks. The cooperative already tested electric delivery vehicles in 2017. Now a BMW i3 and a VW e-Golf are to be put to the test. SachsenEnergie is supporting the company, providing the vehicles and we will show you what experience has been gained at the end of the test.
electric car: baker's companion for the future
BÄKO Ost eG is a cooperative for bakers, confectioners and pepper bakers. There are a total of 27 regional cooperatives that support the baking trade as wholesalers and service providers. More than 140 employees and workers are employed at the Groitzsch plant and the Krieschow warehouse in the Spreewald. They supply the member companies with raw materials, packaging but also merchandise, equipment and much more. In addition to its core task as a wholesaler, since the 1990s the company has also increasingly provided a wide range of services for the trades. The company sees itself as a "companion and partner at eye level".
WHY BÄKO OST EG IS TESTING ELECTRIC CARS
Before the test of the electric cars began, we spoke to Dr Daniel Linke, CEO of BÄKO Ost eG, and asked him about his expectations and opportunities for electric mobility.
umschalten.de: You have already tested electric vehicles in the company. What do you hope to gain from our cooperation? What aspects will you place particular emphasis on?
Dr Daniel Linke:We expect the test over the next 8 weeks to provide us with insights into the extent to which these vehicles are really already suitable for private use. We are particularly interested in questions of the practicability of the charging infrastructure in our region and, of course, the range of the vehicles. In addition, we would like to identify any other requirements / challenges in the use of e-vehicles, in addition to the test with commercial vehicles that we already carried out last year. And finally, we would also like our employees, who are in direct daily exchange with our customers, to become qualified contact persons for our customers. To do this, we believe our employees need to have as much practical experience of EVs as our customers."
umschalten.de: One of the goals of the electric vehicle test is to get our own employees to deal with the topic of electric mobility, as some member companies are already doing this. What opportunities do you currently see for the use of electric vehicles in your company and bakeries?
Dr Daniel Linke: In bakeries - as our last year's test showed - e-vehicles will not yet have the "big breakthrough". On the one hand, this is due to the current uneconomical price-performance ratio in relation to comparable vehicles with other forms of propulsion. On the other hand, most businesses need vehicles with cooling units. As far as we know, these cannot be operated reliably enough with the existing electric drives and, above all, battery capacities. For BÄKO Ost eG itself, e-vehicles do not yet represent a real alternative due to the fact that the company is located relatively far from Dresden, as the range of the vehicles does not yet meet our requirements. But perhaps the test we are now planning will provide us with completely new insights in this regard. We are excited and looking forward to the next few weeks, during which we will be able to test the latest vehicle technology thanks to the support of our energy partner enso.
THIS IS HOW IT CONTINUES
In the course of the test, various employees will try out the vehicles on business trips and their journey home. They will document their experiences in feedback forms, which will be evaluated at the end of the test phase. Afterwards, we will draw a conclusion together with BÄKO Ost eG and report here in the blog on how the test drivers experienced our electric cars. Until then, it is worth taking a look at the company 1st Mould from Pirna, which already has eight electric vehicles in use.
