Tour de Force

Eagle Couriers take time to pay homage to the humble bike

This year’s Tour De France whizzed past faster than a sweaty, yellow-jerseyed Kenyan-born Brit on a carbon fibre frame and we have always been big admirers of the dedication and perseverance of the competitors tackling the stages in the French mountains.

Let’s not underestimate the huge part the bicycle has played in the courier game, after all we’ve taken advantage of the slightly speedier and less arduous motorised version that has made a lot of people’s (excepting Chris Froome, of course) life easier over the year’s.

E-biking isn’t just for Yorkshiremen…

Firstly, we’ve not completely abandoned the humble bike, we still have pedal bike couriers in Glasgow and we’ve made good use of our electrical bikes over the years. We’ve also been sure to share the love donating one to Summerlee Museum in Coatbridge for a bicycle exhibition.

Adding e-bikes to the company has given us the opportunity to employ more young people who might be too young to drive vans. We’re really proud of our role in the community involving everyone across the generations and if we can help get more young people into employment then that’s great news for us.

Not to mention the all-important matter of carbon emissions, the e-bikes lose much less energy than a van, of course, and this plays a big part in our ability to stay green, which is always at the forefront of what we do.

Pedal Power

It’s not all leisurely, feet-up-on-the-handlebars cycling for Eagle. We’ve also been lucky to be involved in one youngster’s mammoth bike ride to raise money for cerebral palsy charity, Bobath Scotland.

By sponsoring him for £250 we were able to boost his fundraising effort as he made the journey from Glasgow to the bonnie banks of Loch Lomond. Covering a 20 mile stretch we were in awe of the commitment on show from the ten year old.

Our director Jerry was particularly impressed: “For a young boy to do something charitable for someone else, is extremely commendable and heart-warming. He did fantastically well and I hope that he has inspired some of the members of the Eagle Couriers team to go on and take part in their own fundraising opportunities.

“As a company we always try and give something back to the community and support charitable causes and events such as Bike for Bobath, whenever we can and this is one such occasion.”

Saddled with a good idea

OK, these might be a little more sedentary than they could have been but we are always excited to get the chance to saddle up and take part ourselves.

As part of the Government’s green transport initiative, we took advantage of the Cyclescheme, which enables employees to cycle to work on a tax free bike, allowing them to save on average half the cost of purchasing a bike themselves.

This is something we definitely didn’t want to miss out on.

Purchasing five bikes for staff here at Eagle we were able to cut the carbon from their commute and up their fitness levels making for healthier and happier couriers making the deliveries all over the country.

Money talks too, and lower fuel bills will undoubtedly have put an extra skip in their…pedals?