Above: The industry average (%) for parcel revenue growth based on the half-year financial results
Postal industry revenue increased by 1.5% for the first half of 2016 (H1 2016), according to the latest Global Industry Report from International Post Corporation (IPC).
The report found that despite the ongoing decline in mail volumes, industry revenue and profitability remained strong as postal operators continued to focus on growth and efficiency initiatives.
In H1 2016, revenue returned to growth for mail at 0.5% compared with the -1% recorded for the same period in 2015. However, parcel revenues slowed to 2.8%, a decrease of 4.3% when compared with the 7.1% recorded for the same period in 2015. The report also states that on aggregate, total postal industry revenue reached 424.4bn (US$454.3bn) in 2015, up 11.6bn (US$12.4bn) when compared with 2014.
The report also helped to demonstrate the diversity of the industry, with mail still accounting for 37.7% of global industry revenue in 2015, down from 48.5% in 2010. Parcels and express accounted for 19.1% of revenue and financial services accounted for 25.9%. Logistics and freight accounted for 10.7% with the remaining 6.6% coming from various other postal activities.
Holger Winklbauer, CEO of IPC, said, “As e-commerce continues to be the most important growth driver in parcels and as tech-savvy consumers require transparent, fast, cheap and convenient deliveries, posts are facing a world of opportunity. Posts have diversified a lot and pursued growth in markets like parcel and express and financial services. Even if the share of mail in overall revenue is decreasing, it is still significant and remains a major focus of postal innovation and investment.
“The postal industry’s parcel volume more than doubled over the last decade, growing at a rate far above economic growth. Parcel volume growth in 2015 accelerated to 7.2% on average more than double that of world GDP (3.1%). However, in line with the continuously increasing online sales, a large opportunity remains for postal operators.”
The IPC Global Postal Industry Report is based on the results of 45 postal operators worldwide with information gathered from a variety of internal and external sources, including questionnaires, carrier intelligence reports, and annual and interim reports from operators.
December 5, 2016