Filling the vacuum

UPS has spent €5.16bn acquiring TNT Express in Europe. It’s the deal everyone is talking about and it raises some interesting questions. Perhaps the most obvious of which is: does this mean the market is now all but closed?

From where I sit, the answer has to be ‘no’ – at least not yet.

Yes, the amalgamation of these two giants will re-draw the landscape of the global logistics market - FedEx and DHL will certainly be thinking hard about what happens next. All the other large players will be busily contemplating what they need to do to stay competitive too. 

In the meantime, the debate about market consolidation rages on.

And while the leviathans of the industry dominate, they don’t actually define the entire market.  Between them, on the one hand, and the very small, local owner-operators on the other, there are acres of space. 

This is space that remains highly fragmented; it’s populated by a mix of different operators of different sizes each with different capabilities. Some operators have sectoral or regional specialisations, while others adopt a more generalist or completely ad-hoc approach. This is very much where the same day slice of the market is in the UK.

Arguably, this is also the space where the really interesting changes are likely to occur. They’re happening already and, in my view, they will continue apace. 

In the last year alone, CitySprint has made five acquisitions – two of which were quite substantial. It’s a strategy that enables us to build scale, extend our geographic reach and continually enhance the service we offer to our customers. 

This type of activity will set the industry up for growth and expansion in the future. The same day market will increasingly be about a few recognised brands with clearly differentiated offers – in our case that means excellent service, flexibility and innovation. 

Then it will be about filling that vacuum of opportunity. We can do this because we can be dynamic. 

For the large, headline-grabbing operators this may be less easy to achieve but that won’t stop the steady march forward of greater consolidation at the top end of the market. 

CitySprint delivers a fresh new look

As CitySprint launches our new brand identity today, it has given me an opportunity to contemplate what a brand really means and why companies rebrand. The English dictionary defines the verb ‘to rebrand’ as “to change or update the image of an organisation or product”, which is certainly technically true. Some people might see a rebrand as no more than a ‘lick of paint’ and, in principle, this is also partly true - we wanted a fresh, new image for 2012.

While we are very much the same company that we were yesterday, we have evolved considerably from the company we were when we launched our old brand, over 10 years ago! All in all, it was definitely time for an update.

Don’t get me wrong; our original brand has served us well. It was created at a time when we wanted to help give a more professional image to the same day courier industry. And over those years it has assisted our growth and accession to the market leader slot in the UK’s same day industry.

Importantly, our new image incorporates views from our clients about CitySprint and what it means to them and their businesses. Their generous feedback, through questionnaires, helped us to gain a 360° perspective. This feedback informed the key elements and messages that underpin the new brand. It reinforced the fact that our old branding needed a fresh, innovative look and tone and that it lacked some impact. As a result, it was our clients’ views that inevitably contributed to our final decision to freshen up our ‘look and feel’ but retain all the positive equity we’d built up in the old brand.

That brings me back to the question of what is really meant by the word ‘brand’. Well to me, brand is something that our staff and clients should be proud of – something that is based on, and reflects, our ethos and the reputation we build on the back of the service we deliver to our customers.

Brand is what defines a culture, not just how it looks. It is something that says you are proud of your achievements to date but recognise the value of continual improvement. The CitySprint brand is definitely more than just a logo – it’s a philosophy that runs throughout our company and which is summarised by our new strap line: ‘we deliver’. This works on so many levels. We deliver a service for our customers, on behalf of our customers. We deliver your best work, original ideas, valuable data, award winning designs, life saving organs, critical machinery and everything else in between. We deliver collaboration.

Whichever way you look at it, we deliver more than just parcels.

So, the new brand is less a new beginning and more the next stage of the journey that builds upon our successes to date and renews our commitment to service excellence for clients. I also think it looks nice and I hope you do too...

Be bold

I’ve never been a great one for predictions – they have a habit of coming back to bite you. However, the start of a new year is a logical prompt for a little thinking aloud. So here are a few thoughts.

The economic pundits are decidedly gloomy: the Eurozone is in crisis; the US is flat-lining; the UK seems to be not much better; and there is doubt over whether the so-called ‘BRIC’s’ can actually make any difference at all despite the relative strength of their respective economies.

Somehow though, the global macro-economic picture feels somewhat remote from what we’re experiencing as a service company in the UK. Volumes have been exceptionally high this Christmas and New Year with double-digit growth on the same time last year.

An enhanced CitySprint, leading the UK’s SameDay industry

Back in August I wrote a blog about the challenges and excitement of making acquisitions. Well, here I am picking up on the same thread because, I am thrilled to say, we’ve just entered into two agreements which put us on track to make our fourth and fifth acquisitions in the past twelve months: we are to acquire the courier operations of two fantastic businesses – Lewis Day and Medical Services Limited (formerly known as Medical Couriers).

The Online Retail Roadblock

There are few things worse than wasting precious spare time organising, chasing and re-organising deliveries of online purchases. Chances are that you will miss the redelivery as well, a vicious circle indeed. In fact, it is such a negative experience that recent research commissioned by IMRG shows that over 43% of regular home shoppers view the delivery experience and delivery options as key influencers in their choice of retailer. This is further underlined by statistics from IMRG showing up to 60% online basket abandonment rates.

Making a difference in healthcare

One of the most satisfying things about my job is developing products which make a genuine difference to peoples' lives. That's the case with PathTrak, a new service we've launched to help the NHS improve patient safety, and save money at the same time.

The Acquisition Trail by Patrick Gallagher, Chief Executive of CitySprint

The acquisition trail is far from easy. There is a host of research which put the chances of a merger and acquisition success between 50 and 75 percent. Not great odds for the investment in money and time that can go into such business transactions. 

I personally believe that it is a true privilege to have the opportunity to acquire a business that is often the vendor's life-work. If there is ever a time when "business is personal" then this is it.

I have endeavoured to outline some of the core elements I view as key in ensuring a successful journey. Invariably, these will not be over-complicated but as always, it is the execution that can sometimes prove trickier...