Post & Parcel Germany Division
As Europe's largest postal company, our core business is the transport, sorting and delivery of documents and goods. We maintain a nationwide post and parcel network in Germany as depicted in the graphic opposite, which we continually expand in consideration of digitalisation and sustainability.
The postal service for Germany
As Europe's largest postal company, our core business is the transport, sorting and delivery of documents and goods. We maintain a nationwide post and parcel network in Germany, which we continually expand in consideration of digitalisation and sustainability.
Our products and services in the mail communication segment are targeted towards both private and business customers and range from physical and hybrid letters to special products for the delivery of goods, and include additional services such as registered mail, cash on delivery and insured items.
In the year under review, the German market for mail communication for business customers was worth around EUR4.3 billion (previous year: around EUR4.2 billion). With declining volumes, the slight rise is due primarily to price increases for some mail products subject to regulation effective from 1 January 2022. The decline in mail volumes in the reporting period is attributable to, amongst other factors, the unusually high level of mail-in ballots in the German federal and state elections in 2021. We monitor the market in which we compete, including the companies that operate as service providers to customers in this market - i. e. both competitors offering end-to-end services and consolidators providing partial services. Our market share increased slightly to 62.1 % compared with the prior year (61.4 %) due to gains recovered from the competition.
Cross-channel dialogue
On request, our Dialogue Marketing unit offers end-to-end solutions to advertisers - from address services and tools for design and creation to printing, delivery and evaluation. This supports cross-channel, personalised and automated dialogue so that digital and physical items with interrelated content are delivered according to a co-ordinated timetable and without any coverage waste.
The German advertising market grew by 4.4 % in 2022 to come in at EUR29.9 billion, ultimately not growing as dynamically as in the previous year. Our share of this highly fragmented advertising market amounted to 5.7 % (previous year: 5.9 %).
DHL Parcel for companies and private individuals
We maintain a dense network of parcel acceptance and drop-off points in Germany, which we expanded and digitalised in the reporting year.
We offer support to businesses to grow their online retail business. Along with the Supply Chain division, we are able to cover the entire logistics chain through to returns management on request.
Various services enable individualised and convenient parcel delivery for private customers: parcels can be delivered to an alternative address, a specific retail outlet or a Paketshop at short notice. Furthermore, registered customers can now have all items sent automatically to a Packstation or selected retail outlet. Additionally, the digital delivery notification for parcels introduced in the previous year is more transparent and more convenient.
The German parcel market continues to be subject to competition-driven structural changes, with established as well as new companies offering their services. In e-commerce, the delivery of a portion of shipments is handled by the merchant's own distribution networks.
There has been no interruption in the medium- and long-term growth trend in the number of online orders. In light of this as well, we will increase the number of Packstations to more than 15,000 in the coming years to make it even more convenient for customers all over Germany to send and receive parcels, and to create an environmentally friendly, traffic-reduced parcel delivery system. Following a successful pilot phase in 2021, we will also make progress in the expansion of Poststations.
Reliable delivery in a challenging environment
According to surveys conducted by Quotas, a quality research institute, around 86 % of all domestic letters posted in Germany during daily opening hours at our retail outlets or before final collection were delivered the very next day in the year under review. Around 96 % were delivered within two days. This puts us above the legally required levels of 80 % (D+1) and 95 % (D+2).
These figures can be deemed very positive in light of the challenging environment in which they were achieved. In the third year of the pandemic, we dealt with high levels of illness amongst employees at times. In addition, the situation on the German labour market remains tense overall.
Our approximately 25,000 person-operated sales points were open for an average of 55 hours per week in the year under review, as was the case in the previous year. Consumers who use the products and services offered by Deutsche Post retail outlets operated mostly by retailers are surveyed annually regarding customer satisfaction by "Kundenmonitor Deutschland". This study attested to the high level of approval enjoyed by Deutsche Post retail outlets: a total of 94.2 % of the persons surveyed were satisfied with the quality and service (previous year: 94.5 %). In addition, customers gave our sales points an average rating of 4.37 out of 5 stars in the Deutsche Post location finder (previous year: 4.31). The fixed-location acceptance and sales network has grown to around 36,300 sites (previous year: around 34,000) thanks to the expansion of our Packstation network.