Smart Charge are an EV charging network developed by Sainsbury's, located on site at Sainsbury's stores, meaning you can charge while you shop! With over 65 sites and 560 charging bays across England, all powered by 100% renewable energy, Smart Charge prides themselves on their customer service and has big plans for their future.
We sat down with Director of Property, Procurement and EV ventures at Sainsbury’s, Patrick Dunne, to hear more about it!
Let's get plugged in...
The Smart Charge brand was launched at the beginning of 2024, but lots of hard work went into what the Sainsbury’s charging experience would look like for some time before that. We recognised that at Sainsbury’s, we have lots of fantastic locations that people regularly drive to as part of their daily and weekly routines, many of them on key transport routes. We also know that making the best use of time is important to our customers. Offering ultra-rapid charging at our stores allows people to make more efficient use their time, as they can top up their charge while they do their shops.
We knew that at Sainsbury’s we had the skills and resources to create a customer-focused, reliable and trusted ultra-rapid charging network. We wanted to build a network that solves many of the issues we experienced charging across the EV charging infrastructure today, which we believe is needed to support the UK’s transition to a lower carbon economy.
We launched our first ultra-rapid EV charging hub in late summer 2023, and we’ve been rolling them out at pace ever since. Smart Charge now has its own dedicated team to build and maintain the distinctive chargers that customers see up and down the country today.
At Sainsbury’s we have over 150 years of expertise of providing outstanding customer service, and this has been directly reflected in how we’ve approached Smart Charge. From the selection of a site, right the way through to its launch, our customers’ experience has always been our number one priority and at the forefront of our decision making.
One of the key decisions we made to prioritise customer experience is ensuring that 100% of our sites have fully accessible bays. Being able to manoeuvre fully around our bays and sites regardless of your mobility needs is important to us, as is ensuring everyone can have a comfortable experience. Rather than only focusing on maximising the number of bays at any site, we’ve chosen to approach our hub design with a more rounded, experience-led approach.
That’s right. Since January 2022, 100 per cent of Sainsbury’s electricity has come from renewable sources – these are a combination of energy sourced directly from on-site solar PVs, our own eight UK wind farms, as well as other sources of renewable electricity from the UK.
We currently have over 65 sites and 560 charging bays across England, Wales and Scotland whilst only operating for just over a year. All of our bays offer the same ultra-rapid charging as well as many sites supporting ChadeMo charging, with simple contactless payment so you know you can rely on us when you need to get your vehicle charged.
On average we’ve been launching around one site per week since opening and are excited looking to the year ahead as to how we can further accelerate the nations confidence in ultra-rapid EV charging.
As you might expect, our main priority throughout installation is optimising the customer experience and journey. Where is the best location in the car park? How will they navigate it effectively? Do we have fully accessible bays? By prioritising our customers at every step of the journey, we are building a network of charging stations people can rely on to be accessible and easy to use.
Of course, there are many factors which go into the decision of choosing a new site, from the demand we see from customers to the availability of power. As we mature as a business, we are constantly learning what makes a great site by listening to our customers and their feedback.
As EV adoption continues to accelerate, those new to the market are looking for easy to use services, ones where you can arrive and immediately understand how to use them, with a simple, intuitive design and minimal extra steps like apps or sign-ups. Smart Charge offers all of this, putting our customers at the forefront of our offer and the decisions that sit behind it.
Reliability is also key here, as people need to trust that they can charge their car when they need to, be this close to or far from home. A lot of the work we do is to ensure our 99%+ uptime levels stay as high as they are now, and that customers have someone to speak to should they need.
Finally, convenience can come in many forms, whether it be ensuring our hubs are in significant locations, such as at our stores on major roads, or simply having the confidence that a Smart Charge hub will be in a well-lit car park, with a supermarket and all of its facilities next door.
We’re installing easy to use and reliable charging hubs in locations that are convenient for our customers, to support those who already need to charge their EVs and give confidence to those to make the switch in the future.
We were proud to launch the Smart Charge and Nectar offer this summer, meaning you can collect Nectar points when charging with us. It was a huge milestone for us to be the first EV charging service to offer customers loyalty benefits from a leading UK loyalty programme. We’re passionate about this as a truly rewarding scheme where customers can use the points they collect at a variety of their favourite brands and there is lots more we plan to do in this space.
All you have to do is input your Nectar card number once you’re charging by scanning the QR code on the charging screen, and the points will be applied to your Nectar account.
Our goals have always been to provide ultra-rapid, reliable and easy to use charging to our customers, and currently all of our sites use Kempower 150kW chargers, with many sites being 300kW capable.
We know that people need ultra-rapid charging, be it because they are on a longer journey, or are timing it perfectly with their weekly shop. As EV adoption increases and technology changes, we’ll be working hard to ensure we stay on top of demand to keep up with our customers’ needs.
It was a fantastic milestone to reach 500 bays, and a great moment to celebrate with the team as to how much we’ve achieved in just over a year. As you say, we’re relatively new to the industry, and our focus is currently on getting the best solution to as many of our customers as possible.
Now with over 500 bays in just over a year across 60+ supermarkets, it’s safe to say we are excited about the years to come and how much progress the EV industry will make. As a business we are never standing still and are constantly looking at how we can improve our sites and technology to give customers the best experience possible. The next 5 years will bring further growth and iterations on that improvement, but we don’t want to spoil any surprises...
Making charging accessible to everyone and providing the best customer experience possible is key when we are thinking about the future of Electric Vehicle adoption in the UK. Partnerships such as these give customers options that best suit their needs, and ultimately make the charging experience smoother for everyone!
That is a difficult one to answer, but if I had to choose it would be a Porsche Macan.
It really is as simple as it seems – just park up, tap your card and plug in! It almost seems too easy, but that’s the way we want it to be.
It’s rare that there is an issue with our sites, but possibly one charger is technically faulted. We are a hub hence lots of other chargers to chose from but we also have a UK based customer support team on hand 24/7 should you have any issues or questions. Our phone number is on our website and at all of our charging points.
Follow us on any of our social media accounts on LinkedIn, Instagram or Facebook. You can also keep an eye on our website where we even show sites that are soon to be launched.
This is a question that is close to our hearts at Smart Charge, having produced an EV Etiquette guide with Etiquette coach William Hanson in the summer! The guide featured 6 tips, but if I had to choose one it would be about ghost charging – don't pretend to plug your EV in without charging to nab a car parking space, meaning someone who needs to can’t charge.
Feeling enlightened or do you think something was missing? Let us know by sharing your feedback.
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