Deutsche Post is to abandon its efforts to compete in the liberalised Dutch domestic mail marketby selling its local subsidiary, Selektmail, to rival company Sandd, the main competitor to TNT
Post.The deal, which has been agreed but still requires approval by the national competitionauthority, marks consolidation of the Dutch domestic market to two main players: the incumbent TNTPost and privately-owned Sandd, with a future market share of about 16%.
Sandd announced yesterday that it intends to take over the activities of Selektmail Nederlandfor an undisclosed sum. It will initially operate two parallel networks but then graduallyintegrate them. The company aims to achieve a market share of 20-25% in future. According to Dutchmedia, it currently has about 10% of the market compared to about 5% for Selektmail.
CEO Gert-Jan Morsink said: “This is a good day for Sandd, and a good day for the Dutch postalmarket. For ten years we have been a stable and reliable partner for our customers, and this stepallows us to continue to build there. Today we see an ambition achieved. “
Launched in 2001 to compete with TNT Post, Sandd now handles about 450 million items a year. Ithas about 14,000 employees, mostly delivery staff, and operates out of 70 branch offices to provide100% geographical coverage of the Netherlands. In 2008, it had revenues of €80 million.
In 2009 it was reported that the company was up for sale and that its owners, mostly financialinvestors, were in talks with Deutsche Post, La Poste and other firms. But nothing came of thesediscussions and the company continued as a privately-owned mail operator.
Selektmail, which now operates under the DHL Global Mail brand, is somewhat smaller than Sanddand has about 12,000 delivery staff. It offers a 48-hour delivery service with deliveries twice aweek, on Tuesdays and Thursdays. The company was acquired by Deutsche Post under the latter’snow abandoned strategy of expanding into selected European domestic mail markets.
Both companies have long faced criticism from labour unions over their employment policies. Theymostly use part-time staff who are paid on the basis of the volumes they deliver rather than afixed salary. However, the Dutch government has given them a deadline of April 1, 2011, to transferat least 80% of their delivery workers to normal employment contracts.
Dutch postal unions welcomed the merger as a step towards ending the price war on the postalmarket.
