Poland based, European parcel locker technology company InPost has said it has seen a better than expected financial results in 2022. This comes as the company warned of slowing demand towards the end of the year in the coming peak season.

In the third quarter, InPost delivered 178.8 million parcels via its parcel lockers, a 32% growth on the same quarter in 2021.

“Not only margins, but also parcel volumes and sales will be better than initially expected,” finance chief Adam Aleksandrowicz told journalists in a call, without providing a figure.

In Q3, sales grew 32.6% to US $361.81 million. It did however see lower volumes in October and earlier this month, which is likely to hit its Q4 period that encompasses the Christmas holiday peak season.

At the same time, inflation in Poland has hit 17.9% in October, which could further hit consumer spending. The company has however increased its prices for major customers like Allegro and this will improve its margins in the short term.

Answering a question on further price increases, Brzoska said “it’s hard to imagine that anyone wouldn’t consider (…) passing-on costs to some degree onto customers,”. He added InPost would do its best to minimise price hikes next year for its internet store and merchant customers.

Delivery management platform provider Bringg and on-demand logistics provider Stuart have announced a partnership in five countries – the UK, France, Italy, Poland and Spain.

Thanks to the partnership, more retailers will be able to deploy an optimised delivery network and offer their customers more flexible and convenient delivery options.

Stuart and Bringg have been working together since 2019 on grocery delivery orders for UK supermarket and convenience chain Co-op. They will now extend this partnership to retailers and grocers across Europe using a hyperlocal ship-from-store solution. This will enable faster setup and delivery of the service across the five countries.

“We are excited to continue working with Bringg, now at an even greater capacity, to provide cutting-edge and flexible delivery solutions to retailers across the five regions,” said Damien Bon, CEO of Stuart. “Our mission is to transform the way consumers receive their goods by connecting all aspects of the supply chain including businesses, delivery providers, and customers. And Bringg will without a doubt help us take a major leap forward towards reaching this goal.”

“The extension of our partnership with Stuart is a testament to our commitment to serving and transforming the European last mile delivery market.” said Guy Bloch, CEO of Bringg. “Together we can enable retailers to scale their delivery capacity, while protecting their profit margins. This combination of scale and efficiency is critical, especially now, in light of the economic uncertainty and continuous supply chain disruptions. It further solidifies our goal to make delivery and fulfillment easily accessible and valuable to everyone.”

Seemingly out of the blue, the Dutch branch of parcel locker company Instabox has been declared bankrupt.

Instabox had only been operating in the Netherlands for a year or so after acquiring its Dutch competitor Je Pakketje.

A court has declared the parcel locker company bankrupt, and a trustee has assumed responsibility for the company. Where a customer is waiting for a parcel in the Instabox network they are to contact the online store they ordered it from.

It is unclear what the bankruptcy means for the company’s operations in the Netherlands. There are to be talks with employees soon.

Instabox is a leading European parcel locker company and in the Netherlands is one of the largest such companies. As such the bankruptcy is a surprise for clients and industry watchers alike. The reasons behind the situation will become clear in the coming weeks.ß

Estonian postal and parcel carrier Omniva has opened its 1,000 Baltics parcel machine in Vilnius. The new machine is one of 270 being replaced and installed as Omniva revamps its regional parcel locker network.

Omniva installed its first parcel machine in Estonia in 2010. Mart Mägi, Chairman of the Management Board of Omniva said, “Since the installation of the first parcel machine, these 12 years of operation have been characterised by both challenges and intensive development in all the Baltic States. It is quite symbolic that our first parcel machine was installed in Estonia, the 500th in Latvia, and the 1,000th in Lithuania. It also shows that we are growing and expanding in all three markets at the same time,” said Mägi. “Expanding the network of parcel machines will remain one of our top priorities. The focus in strategically building the network is to ensure that each new parcel machine is installed in a location that is even more convenient and accessible for our customers.”

 
Mägi also noted the improved sustainability of parcel delivery using parcel lockers. “On the one hand, we have set ourselves an ambitious goal to strive for – we want to make the process of receiving and sending parcels as easy as possible for consumers. On the other hand, we are increasingly focusing on sustainability. Investments in parcel machines also contribute to saving the environment, as an efficient network of parcel machines enables the delivery of the same number of parcels with a fraction of the CO2 emissions compared to home delivery,” Mägi explained.

The 2022 Amazon Economic Impact in the UK report has shown that it has made direct investments in the country worth £43bn since 2010. It estimates that this has in turn contributed £36 billion of GDP in that time.

One of the big ways Amazon has contributed to GDP has been through the independent selling partners that account for more than half of all product sales on the Amazon UK website. According to the online giant, more than 85,000 UK SMEs sell on its marketplace, the majority of which are outside London.

Amazon created £4.4 billion to the South East of England’s GDP since 2010. However, SMEs based in Manchester, Belfast and Glasgow recorded some of the highest annual revenues and surpassed those based in London.

More than 600,000 small businesses around the world have taken advantage of the Amazon Small Business Accelerator since it launched in 2020.

Banbury Amazon delivery station manager Andy Barber said: “Amazon is a proud member of the community in Berkshire, Bucks and Oxfordshire, investing over £3 billion in the region since 2010 to support local businesses, create jobs and make a positive contribution to the regional economy.

“We help more than 3,000 small businesses across Berkshire, Bucks and Oxfordshire sell on Amazon and reach customers around the world, and we also continue to support community organisations across the region through donations and volunteering.

“Recently, we have donated to a range of good causes including BYHP (Supporting Young People in Housing Need) while working with Magic Breakfast to deliver healthy breakfasts to vulnerable children and schools.”

Parcel delivery technology company Quadient has announced plans to install its Parcel Pending by Quadient parcel lockers in Ireland.

The new parcel lockers will be focused on new property developments as the country experiences a boom in house building. Quadient say in a statement, they “will help property developers and property management organisations transform parcel pickup: providing a secure location for residents’ parcel deliveries with 24/7 access; in turn freeing up time for building management to deal with other tasks; and reducing the physical and environmental footprint of parcel delivery.”

“Property is a highly competitive marketplace in Ireland, and high-density housing will be crucial to meeting the country’s housing needs,” said Ian Caminsky, SVP and MD Parcel Locker Solutions, UKI & DACHIT at Quadient. “This demands a new approach for processing parcels and packages. An Post alone delivered 56 million packets and parcels in its last reporting year – an average of 29 per household. Combine that figure with deliveries from other carriers, and management teams at high-occupancy communities will be faced with a flood of parcels every week. Employees will either need to receive, log, store and distribute these parcels, taking time away from other tasks, or run the risk of unwatched parcels potentially being stolen. Automated lockers can reduce the pressure on management teams, while creating a more pleasant, liveable service and environment for residents.”

The company already has a strong presence in Ireland with its mailing and customer experience services. It envisages that the new parcel lockers will provide more opportunities to the property industry to realise the benefits of automated parcel lockers.

After announcing profits of £1.6 million for the last financial year, Guernsey Post has announced it is to install a £1.8 million parcel sorting machine. This is to help the carrier meet the changes in demand from being a postal to a parcel carrier.

The new automated parcel sorting machine will be able to process up to 6,000 parcels an hour. It is to be installed in July as part of general plans to update the mail operator’s HQ.

Due to the investment, Guernsey Post has said it will make a short term loss. Boley Smillie, chief executive, said: “The company is embarking on a multimillion-pound investment, funded from our own reserves, which includes the redesign of its postal headquarters and the installation of fully automated parcel sorting equipment.”

Guernsey Post’s finance director, Steve Sheridan, said: “We are excited to invest in this new parcel technology, which will enable Guernsey Post to be more efficient and grow our capacity.During the pandemic, Guernsey Post experienced strong growth in parcel volumes to levels that we would not have otherwise anticipated to reach for another three or four years. Our existing forecasts suggest that this growth will continue for the foreseeable future, albeit at a slower rate. However, the parcel growth is in stark contrast to the decline of core letter revenue which continues to fall by more than 10% per year.”

As with all postal operators, the carrier is facing a softening of volumes thanks to energy price inflation that is in turn causing an uplift in labour cost demand. This will impact future revenues, but the investment is for the long term and not short term issues.

In response to weak demand, FedEx has reduced the frequency of flights and parked some of its cargo aircraft.

The international carrier has halted around 23 US domestic flights and nine International ones. At the same time it has reduced sorting points and consolidated loads at its domestic Ground unit.

The news comes after FedEx had announced plans to cut costs by as much as $2.7 billion in its current financial year due to a range of issues that include weakening markets in Asia and Europe.

Chief Financial Officer Mike Lenz said at at the Baird 2022 Global Industrial Conference, ”Unquestionably, the commencement and the speed and depth of that shift was beyond what we certainly had anticipated,” he noted. “That’s why we have been taking down trans-Pacific flights,” he added.

FedEx has been preparing for a weak holiday season as can been seen in our reports here at Apex Insight. This shows weakness where rivals Deutsche Post DHL have managed to go from strength to strength in the same economic headwinds. The peak season is a critical time for last mile delivery carriers and this could be particularly challenging for FedEx.

Led by its booming B2B businesses, Deutsche Post DHL Group has seen a 20% increase in revenues to €24 billion in the third quarter of the financial year, compared to the same period in 2021-22.

“The first three quarters of the year were the most successful in our company’s history. EBIT remained above EUR 2.0 billion in all three quarters. Even if global growth is losing momentum, we are well on track to achieve the best result ever with an EBIT of around EUR 8.4 billion,” said Frank Appel, CEO of Deutsche Post DHL Group. “The foundation for our success is our global logistics business, which is extremely well balanced in terms of sectors and regions, powered by our dedicated workforce. This makes us a reliable partner for our customers all around the world – especially in these volatile times.”

Deutsche Post DHL’s B2B businesses – the Global Forwarding, Freight, Supply Chain and Express divisions – were the main drivers behind the logistics giant’s success. At the same time, the domestic parcels business in Germany seems to be recovering even in the face of the fuel-price induced inflation that has affected the whole of Europe.

This shows a glimmer of hope in the sector as other logistics companies struggle in the face of higher costs and lower margins.

Ahead of the projected surge in volumes over the holiday period, FedEx has suspended its money-back guarantees for overnight delivery services in the US and for four international services. This will take place from the 13th December.

As with rivals UPS, FedEx offers a money-back guarantee where late or missed deliveries are proven to be down to the carrier. Both companies suspended these guarantees in 2020 amidst the surge in parcel volumes due to the pandemic, and this is the third consecutive peak season that FedEx has done the same.

FedEx said in its note announcing its peak-season suspension that the status of full money-back guarantees is “being evaluated on an ongoing basis, and our focus remains on continuing to provide the best possible service to our customers during this period of uncertainty.”

It is worthy of note that the logistics giant has not announced how many seasonal staff it has taken on for the peak season, which is usually made with some fanfare. The money-back guarantee suspension may well be because an unexpected surge could overwhelm FedEx, should it have been conservative in the numbers of seasonal staff it has hired.