UPS finds favour with German logistics managers

United Parcel Service (UPS), the US parcel forwarding company, enjoys the most favourable image among logistics service providers on the German market, according to the annual survey by the market research institute Emnid involving 300 logistics managers. The German shipping and logistics company Hapag-Lloyd Container Line ranks second, while Lufthansa Cargo, the freight arm of the airline group Deutsche Lufthansa, ranks third. They are followed by DPD Deutscher Paketdienst, which belongs to the French group La Poste, US group Federal Express (Fedex) and Hermes, a subsidiary of the German mail order group Otto. DHL, the German market leader, ranks only 11th with a verdict of ‘average’.

According to the survey, UPS scores particularly well in terms of quality, 85 per cent of participating logistics managers having viewed its product quality positively, compared with only 69 per cent at DHL. In terms of customer orientation, 64 per cent of the managers have given a favourable verdict for DHL, compared with 76 per cent for UPS. It is believed that DHL may be burdened by its image as a state enterprise. Deutsche Bahn, the German national rail operator, is the backmarker. Its subsidiary Schenker has fared worse in this year’s study than that for 2004 in all key image factors, such as price-performance relation, customer orientation and product quality, as well as management quality. It is uncertain, however, whether the performance of Schenker has actually deteriorated, or whether it is simply suffering from the negative image of parent Deutsche Bahn.

Original article by A Granzow and E Krummheuer

Abstracted from Handelsblatt