TNT has opened its new £15.5 million super-depot in Swindon, UK, enabling faster deliveries for customers in south-west England, and a 6,350 sqm depot in Eindhoven, Netherlands, while introducing a new truck service between Valencia, Spain, and Paris, France.
Built by industrial warehouse developer IDI Gazeley on a new 10-acre site on the South Marston Industrial Estate, the south-west depot and regional sortation hub in Swindon is expected to considerably improve delivery services to and from the 467,000 businesses in the region.
TNT stressed that not only the regional businesses but also companies throughout the UK will feel the benefits of the new facility as it “frees up capacity elsewhere in TNT’s network”, which transports over 1.5 million shipments per week.
The state-of-the-art building with 101 doors features purpose-built sorting technology to process over 650 items per minute. Since the opening of the new facility, 85 new jobs have been created in a wide range of managerial, warehouse and driving roles.
The new facility makes TNT’s operations more efficient by keeping local parcel traffic in the South West and reducing the need for shipments destined to southern England to be transported to and from TNT’s Midlands-based sortation hubs each night.
Marianne Culver, Managing Director of TNT UK (Domestic), said: “The opening of Swindon and the improved service it allows us to deliver to customers is great news, not just for TNT, but most importantly for the tens of thousands of UK businesses we serve every single day. Swindon is a flagship development and will set new standards of excellence in how we operate, the technology we use and how we utilise our strongest assets, our people.”
Closely located to the M4 motorway, Swindon was chosen as the ideal location for the new site, thanks to its easy motorway access to cities and major industrial centres across the wider South of England, as well as TNT’s central hubs.
Macro van Kalleveen, TNT’s global Managing Director of Domestics, who attended the hub’s opening ceremony this month, identified the site as one of the key infrastructure developments, as part of the company’s on-going global Outlook Strategy.
Meanwhile, TNT also inaugurated its Eindhoven depot in the Netherlands after a ten-month construction period. The new facility makes it possible to handle more parcels and freight for customers across north-western Europe in a faster and more reliable manner.
The depot operates daily linehauls to other TNT sorting hubs in Liege, Arnhem, Northampton, Paris and Zurich, as well as direct deliveries to customers. It features 105 loading docks and state-of-the-art sorting and loading equipment. The new depot is housed in a BREEAM certified building.
In Spain, TNT has launched a new direct land route from Valencia to Paris which enables the company to reach any French town within three days on average. The new daily route considerably improves Valencia’s previous connection with the French capital as it goes directly to Paris without stopping in Barcelona.
“Thanks to this new direct connection, we have managed to reduce the transit time by one day compared to the previous option, with the route now taking an average of three days. And there are almost 3,000 locations we reach only in two days,” José Luis Casaudoumecq, Commercial Director of TNT Spain, said.
The direct connection prevents fraud and potential capacity problems in the intermediate transit centres, which ensures a fast and reliable service while also minimising the possibility of damage. In addition, it allows TNT to make collections on the same day.
