Yodel claims “successful” peak season after limiting volumes

Major British parcels delivery company Yodel is claiming a “successful” peak season afterdelivering 14 million parcels in the run-up to Christmas – and after limiting volumes to avoid a

The privately-owned company stressed that for Christmas 2012 it had invested heavily in detailedplanning, which began in the spring, “in order to ensure great service and meet retailer andshopper demands”. This included intensive forecast demand processes and increasing its operationalcapacity with additional temporary service centres and 15 contingency warehouses and increasedstorage at its busiest locations.

Yodel said it also invested heavily in recruiting temporary workers earlier to ensure extendedtraining, boosting its peak workforce to 16,000, while deliveries were increased to seven days aweek in order to cope with the additional parcel volumes throughout December.

The company, which delivers about 170 million parcels a year, also claimed that its positivepeak season saw a number of major clients switch parcel volume from other suppliers who “struggled”and said it expected to announce a number of new business wins early in 2013.

Dick Stead, chairman of Yodel, commented: “Our planning paid off and, despite flooding in someareas, all of our nationwide service centres were clear at close of play on Christmas Eve with theexception of a small number of parcels, where we were either unable to obtain access to the addressor the addressee was unavailable to sign for them.

“As always we will be reviewing our peak performance and seeking to work with our retail clientsto innovate and further improve the service in 2013,” he added.

The performance was a stark contrast to Christmas 2011 when Yodel was criticised for failing todeliver a record 20 million parcels on time. That was an unexpected 20% higher volume that plannedfor. In 2009 the company delivered some 14.5 million parcels followed by 12.8 million in 2010,although this was impacted by severe winter weather.

Last year also saw the shake-up of Yodel’s top management following the troubled integration ofthe former DHL Express UK domestic B2B parcels business which had been acquired in March 2010. CEOJonathan Smith and two other senior managers left the company in the autumn and former Parcelforcemanaging director Dick Stead took over as executive chairman instead.