Deutsche Post plans to employ passenger buses to deliver parcels in Germany

Deutsche Post AG, the German-based logistics service provider, which is also the Europe’s biggest name in logistics and mail delivery services, is reportedly planning to deliver parcels by long-distance buses to speed up their services. The need for developing faster parcel delivery services has been heightened as online retailers like the Amazon.com establishes its own logistic arms.

Juergen Gerdes, head of Deutsch Post’s Bon-based parcel and e-commerce operations, revealed in an interview that the experimental move by the company will use a German network of yellow passenger buses to cover 120 cities from Hamburg to Munich. He also said that transporting deliverables by bus will reduce the delivery time significantly in comparison with the company’s highly usual delivery system. The business customers will benefit from the cheaper options they are offered as a result of this system while for the residential clients it would mean much faster delivery.

"We'll go with whatever our customers prefer," Gerdes, who is planning to raise operating profit from mail and parcel delivery to 3 percent a year until 2020, was quoted by the Sydney Morning Herald as saying. "When we developed the parcel locker more than 10 years ago, no one but us believed it would work. Now it has 8 million registered users."

The news site reported that the company has brought on board a fleet of 90 yellow Scania buses, which have been branded Postbuses for improving the capacity of the company in delivering mails and parcels as fast as possible to their destination. They have been launched in 2013 for the purpose of carrying passengers.

However, when asked about the “plans,” a Deutsche Post spokesperson said, “This is not correct. We could imagine it is possible and we are thinking about it. But there is really nothing concrete.”

The delivery network of the Deutsche Post has been adequate for decades like many other traditional companies. But with the advent of Internet shopping, the number of mails dropped and the volume of parcels to be delivered increased considerably. Web-based retailers such as the Amazon and eBay have developed their own in house logistic services whereas home delivery services are being developed by traditional suppliers such as the Walmart.

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