Christmas 2010: Early signs positive!
Simon Veale, director at Global Freight Solutions (GFS), brings some early festive cheer to Post&Parcel. You know when the office calendar has once more reached the page for November. The gaily-coloured streetlights are turned on by the country’s boy bands, jolly red-faced men with white beards start getting harassed by infants and extravagant Marks & Spencer television advertisements urge everyone to buy mince pies and lingerie. Preparations for Christmas are, in other words, well and truly underway.
Popular belief would have it that the seasonal rush for the country’s carrier industry peaks in the final days before 25 December thanks to a crescendo of consumer parcel traffic. However, while the volume of B2C packages undoubtedly climbs the nearer we get to Christmas Day, the overall picture is somewhat different.
This week will arguably attract even more attention from couriers nationwide. We are likely to see the largest spike in seasonal shipments as retailers continue stocking up for what they hope will be the shopping frenzy to come.
The boom in internet retailing in recent years has meant that shoppers are now able to buy online much later than they might ever have considered doing on the High Street. The consequent values attached to such patterns are staggering. Online sales last December were worth £5.46bn in the UK alone and were largely responsible for an increase of some 40% on normal daily parcel volumes.
But no matter how increasingly popular e-commerce has become, it still only amounts to between 5-6% of overall retail sales domestically. Therefore, carriers both large and small play a crucial part in filling store shelves in order that store owners can turn the last intense six weeks of activity before Christmas into jingling tills.
This year, the parcel-carrying sector could be forgiven for approaching the festive season not with cheer but with fear. Britons have not yet completely slipped the icy grip of recession which has afflicted the economy for the last two years.
Furthermore, just when the supposed green shoots of recovery were reported to have broken ground, the country was subjected to the Government’s Comprehensive Spending Review which, according to many commentators, had given rise to suspicions that this year’s seasonal spirit might be misery.
However, Global Freight Solutions (GFS) can hopefully provide some light in the wintry gloom. Things, it would appear, are not quite as bad as the doomsayers have predicted. While the prevailing uncertainty is still with us, trading is brisk.
As carrier manager, it’s our job to work with the big-name carriers on behalf of our many customers in sectors as diverse as food and drink, financial services, baby products, engineering and leisure.
Our client roster numbers not only household brand retailers and manufacturers who are hopeful of a Christmas sales uplift but the companies who make the chip and PIN machines upon which those transactions will be processed.
Our confidence isn’t based just on very recent experience with and exposure to those clients and our many carrier partners. The GFS team is made up of individuals, like myself, who have spent many years working in the post and parcel industry.
The early indications are that 2010 will be better than 2009 for clients and carriers alike – but not dramatically so. Retailers have made their predictions as to likely trade, placed their orders accordingly and this coming week will see the carriers hugely busy as a result.
That’s not to say that there may not be issues, similar to the strikes last year by Royal Mail staff, which might affect the expected parcel cycle for commercial organisations and consumers alike.
Already, question marks have been posed by companies working in the nursery products industry as to whether the withdrawal by carriers of provision for large and bulky items might impact on order fulfilment.
In the last few months, GFS has also experienced a rise in enquiries from firms working in a variety of different sectors who are keen that a seasonal rush doesn’t lead to a constriction of supply that means delays likely to kill off any prospect of repeat orders.
The hope, though, is that the initial brisk trading translates into sustained business through Christmas and into 2011. After the prolonged churn of the economic rollercoaster ride since 2008, no-one, however, is going to relax for a second.
