Retailers are raising wages and offering bonuses as they seek to deal with nationwide driver shortages, with Marks & Spencer the latest to do so. M&S is offering HGV drivers a £2,000 sign-on bonus which is part of a wider £5,000 incentive package that includes additional retention payments. It follows (more…)
Central England Co-op has signed a delivery partnership with Snappy Shopper to allow shoppers in the Midlands and East Anglia to order groceries online from 141 local Central England Co-op stores and have them delivered in 30 minutes. It follows a trial that began in September last year with 15 (more…)
Pets at Home has begun a trial to deliver orders placed online from store stock, making greater use of its store estate as a distribution network. The company already has a strong click and collect model for its stores but the new trial will see customer orders shipped from store (more…)
Bloom & Wild has become the latest retailer to sign up to Royal Mail’s Sunday delivery service, announced earlier in the year. Moonpig began Sunday deliveries using the service earlier this month. Royal Mail has been a delivery partner for Bloom & Wild since the flower gifting business was founded (more…)
The number of temporary workers taking delivery driver jobs has fallen by more than a quarter, according to new research from Indeed Flex. It suggests that many have returned back to their pre-pandemic jobs in retail and hospitality but comes at a time when driver demand is soaring, up 15.6% (more…)
Oxford this week became DPD’s first all-electric city, with all future parcel deliveries in Oxford to now be made using only electric vehicles. Oxford will be followed by nine further UK ‘green cities’ to be confirmed later this year. The move is part of DPD’s pledge to deliver ‘green’ to (more…)
InPost is partnering with Yellow Octopus Group to encourage consumers to recycle their clothing, donating it to charity or for other recycled uses. The partnership means that consumers earn exclusive discount coupons for a range of retailers such as Missguided and Superdry for each donation made. Consumers simply register their (more…)
The UK Warehousing Association (UKWA) has appealed for exemption from self-isolation for warehouse workers. Clare Bottle, who joined as the new chief executive for the UKWA earlier this summer, has written to Rachel Maclean, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department for Transport, to make the case for logistics (more…)
Marks and Spencer has pledged to become the first big retailer in Britain to launch same-day and half-day delivery of clothing to customers, aiming to be faster than rivals such as Asos and Next. It’s understood the proposed service would be nationwide. Products will be delivered via a ship from (more…)
A third (34%) of retailers don’t offer next day delivery, according to research from ParcelHub and Brightpearl. This is despite the fact that when it comes to paying for delivery, 45% of consumers said the options of next day delivery would make them more likely to buy, more than double (more…)
Two-thirds of UK consumers believe the Government should crackdown on online delivery CO2 emissions and force online retailers to invest in more sustainable options, according to a new survey. 7 out of ten said they were supportive of a Trustmark that would show whether an online retailer was trying to (more…)
Ocado has suffered another warehouse fire fuelled by its robots, two years after a robot battery fault sparked a fire that destroyed its Andover distribution centre. The most recent fire, at its centre in Erith south east London, is believed to have been caused by the collision of three robots (more…)
Businesses in the logistics and warehousing sector must adapt if they are to win the post-pandemic talent war, according to Lorna Davidson, CEO of flexible working company Redwigwam. She said job demand in logistics and warehousing was amongst the highest across all industries. “A combination of Covid-19 and Brexit means (more…)
Pets at Home has revealed that more than 300,000 orders have been placed under its one hour click and collect service since its launch. Following the success of the click and collect implementation Pets at Home is to extend its order management solution to include a Ship from Store stock (more…)
Etsy has integrated with Hermes UK, with the delivery firm developing an API which connects its services with the global online marketplace and improving the experience for sellers on Etsy. The move means that from the end of this month Etsy sellers will no longer have to enter data manually (more…)
New research from Sorted suggests that 42% of customers missed an average of three deliveries due to brand miscommunication by a brand or courier during the pandemic. That number is expected to rise further after 19th July when greater freedoms means that nearly two-thirds (63%) of consumers expect to be (more…)
Online electricals retailer AO has opened a new ‘rework’ facility within its Latchford warehouse in Crewe where appliances returned by customers will be thoroughly tested with the aim of reselling them. The facility opened last month and is already handling approximately 900 appliances a week, including washing machines, fridges and (more…)
Smartphone solutions have displaced dedicated scanners in the last in the last mile, according to new research from Scandit, in collaboration with ITTS. It found that smartphone solutions are now a key part of the last mile technology toolkit for two-thirds (67%) of European postal and logistics providers. Respondents are (more…)
Yodel has launched a new consumer-to-consumer service, Yodel Direct, aimed at the growing number of small businesses that have appeared throughout the pandemic. Customers will be able to ship parcels up to 60x50x50cm and weighing up to 10kg via the Yodel Direct service. Once they have booked a delivery slot they can (more…)
Warehouse automation and robots could help tackle a looming labour shortage in UK warehouses by addressing the barriers that deter people from working in the sector, according to a new survey by fulfilment solutions provider 6 River Systems. EU nationals returning to their home countries as a result of a (more…)