DHL Express France is preparing for this year’s Christmas peak with more capacity, flights and additional delivery tours as it expects to handle 15% more parcels than at the same time last year, driven by strong B2C growth.
From December 7 to 24, DHL Express expects to handle 30% more parcels than on average during the year, with a total of nearly three million parcels during the month and up to 200,000 parcels to be processed on some days.
The company explained that the parcel volumes have been especially boosted by the growing online sales in France that are expected to reach €65 billion in revenues for 2015 exceeding the initial forecast of €62.4 billion, according to the French e-commerce association Fevad. French e-commerce revenues increased by 15% in the third quarter while Christmas online sales are predicted to increase by 13% to nearly €13 billion.
Michel Akavi, DHL Express CEO, said: “E-commerce is experiencing unprecedented growth, in France and elsewhere, and online sales are expected to break all records this Christmas. With B2C, we see an increase in deliveries from abroad of more than 25% per year. These B2C deliveries in France now account for up to 15,000 packages per day.
“The development of e-commerce is really transforming our business. The B2C activities are growing and we must adjust to manage these specific flows. We need to take into account the restrictions of private recipients to manage to deliver at first attempt. That is why we have developed a wide range of tools such as SMS alerts, evening and Saturday delivery tours, etc. We make every effort to ensure that online shoppers receive their packages as fast as possible. And for Christmas, we are all ready to deliver the gifts on time!" he added.
At DHL Express France, deliveries to private customers currently make up 25% of its activity, compared to only 5% in 2010.
To respond to the volume growth, DHL Express has deployed additional flights on Saturday mornings, including to Nantes, Toulouse, Bordeaux, Marseille, etc. Overall, it will operate ten additional flights on December 12 and 19, bringing the total number of flights on the two weeks before Christmas to 330.
DHL Express is also introducing 600 additional delivery tours and offering deliveries in the evenings and on Saturdays with automatic pre-alert systems (SMS, e-mail). In case of absence during delivery, recipients can choose another delivery address (neighbour, workplace) to arrange home delivery or pick up the parcel at the nearby parcel shop etc.
In the three weeks before Christmas, DHL Express has also hired 600 additional workers to cope with the increasing parcel volumes.
As part of an existing partnership between DHL Express and Mondial Relay, DHL customers can pick up their parcels at one of the 5,000 Points Relais parcel shops. During the Christmas period, DHL Express expects 3,500 parcels to be delivered to the shops daily.
