Parcel Motel accepts challenge posed by Irish e-commerce appetite
Nightline has revealed that it is not only Ireland’s appetite for online shopping which is growing, but also the size of goods bought by consumers. The delivery firm reported that the number of oversized items handled by its Parcel Motel terminals has doubled each year since the network launched three years ago.
Although subscribers are made aware of the dimensions of locker boxes when they sign up, Parcel Motel General Manager, Orla Sheils, has been asked to deal with large screen televisions, car tyres, bicycles and even a canoe.
She stressed that even though the purchases would not fit into the units, Parcel Motel had expanded its operations to accommodate shoppers’ tastes in large-sized buys.
“There appears to be a link between the frequency with which some people buy online and use Parcel Motel as their chosen delivery point and the proportions of items bought.
“We receive about 600 very large items each week that are just too big to leave in one of our lockers. That number can double in the run-up to Christmas.
“In many cases, these goods have been bought from UK retailers and it’s much cheaper to deliver via Parcel Motel than pay the costs of shipping direct to consumers’ homes in the Republic of Ireland.”
In previous cases, said Sheils, Parcel Motel has made individual arrangements with the consumers and retailers to ensure swift delivery.
“However,” added Sheils, “given that delivery delays and even returns potentially create big headaches for consumers to go with the size of items ordered, we have now decided to allow collection from eight of our depots in order to simplify the process.”
Parcel Motel currently has 8,000 individual lockers in operation in every one of Republic of Ireland’s 26 states. On average, they measure 41cms (16”) by 38cms (15”) wide and 64cms (25”) deep.
Sheils said the lockers also had a maximum weight limit of 10 kgs (22 lbs). She added that people buying items which were too big for the lockers would instead be allowed to collect their purchases from eight of the company’s 11 sites across the Irish Republic – at Athlone, Tralee, Waterford, Sligo, Cork, Galway and Limerick.
Nightline recently announced that it had opened a new 30,000 square foot depot in Dublin’s dedicated to processing Parcel Motel traffic.
More than 150,000 individuals have now subscribed to the system, which was launched in July 2012 and handled more than 1.5 million parcels in the last year – more than double the figure for the previous 12 months.
Recent figures from e-commerce analysts concluded that Ireland had become western Europe’s fourth biggest online marketplace, spending some €4.6 billion with internet retailers during 2013 alone.
