Hermes has opened a €55 million logistics centre in Hamburg to continue its capacity expansion in Germany as parent Otto Group hits record e-commerce sales.
The new 9,000 sqm facility, which can process up to 100,000 parcels per day, was ceremonially opened yesterday at an event with 300 guests and will go into operation on April 1, creating 200 jobs.
"With the opening of this distribution centre in our home city of Hamburg, we are setting standards both economically and ecologically. With its high capacity, the logistics centre is an important building block in parcel delivery in northern Germany. I am particularly pleased that from spring of this year we will be delivering from here with zero-emission electric vans," said Olaf Schabirosky, CEO of Hermes Germany.
The B2C specialist will deliver emission-free in Hamburg city centre with Mercedes-Benz eVito and eSprinter vans. Overall, the company plans to deploy a fleet of 1,500 electric vehicles across Germany in the coming years. It is also testing electric cargo bikes in several locations at present.
Kay Schiebur, Otto Group board member for services, emphasised: "This new distribution centre ideally meets the high demands placed on logistics today in terms of flexibility, speed and reliability. This makes it a key investment in future competitiveness. We want to remain one of Germany's leading parcel service providers and grow in the interests of our customers.”
Hamburg mayor Peter Tschentscher praised Hermes’ move to deliver emission-free with electric vehicles in the city centre in future and described the new logistics centre as “a major step in the right direction” with environmentally-friendly logistics solutions.
The centre, which is part of a €300m investment programme, was built by Hamburg-based developer ECE, which is responsible for all of Hermes’ new centres across Germany. Four other new Logistics Centres have already gone into operation in Mainz, Bad Rappenau near Heilbronn, Graben close to Augsburg and in Ketzin near Berlin, and four more are due to follow.
Meanwhile, Hermes’ parent company Otto Group increased global online sales by 5.1% to about €7.7 billion, according to preliminary figures for its 2018/19 business year, which ended yesterday (February 28). Online sales in Germany went up by 5.9% to €5.4 billion, with the main brand OTTO increasing online sales by more than 8% to about €3 billion.
The Hamburg-based group described its e-commerce growth in 2018 as “solid and sustainable” despite an extremely challenging year for textile and furniture retailing.
