DHL Express Germany has officially opened its new facility in the region of Freiburg, south-eastern Germany, with an overall investment of around €10 million, in response to growing shipping volumes in the region.
The new facility, located in the industrial area of Herbolzheim, was built last year by the real estate company Adler Immobilien Investment GmbH on a total area of 14,500 sqm, with DHL Express operational and office space totaling around 3,000 sqm.
"With this modern facility, we have almost tripled the capacity of our previous service station in Lahr thus responding to the continuous shipping volume growth of around 7% per year over the last few years,” Wolfgang Albeck, managing director of DHL Express Germany, said. “Thanks to the geographical relocation, we are now also closer to the main shipment flow.”
The core of the facility is a state-of-the art sorting system designed for shipping volumes of around 2,400 pieces per hour. “This sorting system as well as the possibility of direct loading and unloading for 40 delivery vehicles enables us to handle the shipping process faster and more efficiently,” Albeck explained adding that many export-oriented companies in the region can now profit from considerably shorter processing times.
The previous DHL Express facility was located in direct proximity of the DHL parcel centre in Lahr but couldn’t grow further due to space constraints. Ernst Schilling, the mayor of Herbolzheim, welcomed the establishment of DHL Express in the city during the inauguration ceremony yesterday. "We are delighted that we now have won with DHL Express another business unit of Deutsche Post DHL Group for the industrial area and interpret this as a positive sign for the attractiveness of our location."
The new facility offers benefits for the 75 employees at the site as the workplaces comply with the current technical and ergonomic standards, including offices and social rooms equipped in a much more modern and comfortable way than it was the case in the previous location.
In addition, energy-saving materials were used for the construction, including the LED technology for the lightning of the entire hall. The DHL Express facility meets the safety requirements of the Transported Asset Protection Association (TAPA) and has thus received the globally recognised ‘TAPA Class A’ certification.
