DHL opens new parcel sorting center in Amsterdam

By

Shomara Roosblad

Published
Sep 24, 2018

On Thursday 20 September, DHL Parcel opened a new sorting center at Atlaspark in Amsterdam, focused on growth in capacity and quality.

The new sorting center has received an investment of €35 million and is a part of DHL’s further expansion in the Netherlands.

The new Amsterdam-based parcel sorting center is one of 15 sorting centers in the Netherlands, which together with six centers in Belgium form a Benelux-wide network.

Achim Dünnwald, chairman of the management board at DHL Parcel, commented in a statement: “With the growth of cross-border e-commerce traffic, the importance of a broad and well-functioning, transparent and affordable European parcel network is increasing. The Netherlands is a crucial link in that network, and a model for the rest of Europe.”

DHL said that the new parcel center is part of a multi-year, large-scale investment plan. This year alone, DHL invested €40 million and the amount will exceed €150 million over the next two years. In addition to buildings, the upcoming investments will focus on the expansion of shipping services and the DHL fleet.

Wouter van Benten, CEO at DHL Parcel Benelux, added: “We are investing heavily to continue [our] growth in the right direction and to extend the service level in a sustainable way.”

Last week, the Thuiswinkel Markt Monitor, a study on online consumer spending in the Netherlands, reported that Dutch consumers spent  €11.83 billion at online stores in the first six months of 2018, an 11% increase, compared to H1 2017. As e-commerce is rapidly growing in the Netherlands, it will be interesting to see what further expansion of DHL in the Netherlands will mean for Dutch retailers and the services they will be able to offer their customers.

In January, Dutch footwear chain Omoda, announced same-day delivery. With the new service, Omoda canceled its longtime partnership with Dutch parcel company PostNL to start a partnership with DHL. At the time, Omoda said that ‘the collaboration with DHL marks a step that the company will take to optimize its customer service’.

At the moment, DHL is the second largest e-commerce carrier and market leader in the business-to-business segment.