1500 new jobs to be created by DPD

Parcel firm DPD is to invest £175 million to expand its capacity to meet growing demand from the online retail boom. The investment will create 1500 new, full-time jobs.

DPD plans to build a new, purpose-built £100 million parcel sorting hub - one of largest of its kind in Europe - in the East Midlands in addition to refurbishing two of its other hubs to increase the number of parcels it can handle each night. The investment follows a period of unprecedented growth spearheaded by the company's Predict service which was launched in March 2010 and has generated over £70 million of new business to date and over 1000 new full-time jobs in the past 12 months, as a flood of major retailers switched to DPD.

The service utilises the latest GPS tracking technology to provide customers with a one-hour delivery window so they do not have to wait in all day for their parcel. More than 97 per cent of the millions of parcels delivered each year with Predict are delivered 'right first time', meaning fewer wasted trips for drivers redelivering parcels or customers having to go to the depot to pick up a missed delivery.

The company has also announced a major investment in its nationwide network of depots with £20 million assigned to upgrade a number of its existing 40 locations and build ten new depots over the next 15 months. Other investments include the replacement of all the handheld devices used by drivers for route optimisation and parcel administration and ongoing investment in security and IT upgrades.

Dwain McDonald, DPD CEO, said: "I'm delighted to announce this very significant investment in new jobs and infrastructure. DPD has been expanding year on year and is now the fastest growing major carrier in the UK. This investment will allow us to expand our network capacity further to meet the demands from our customers and maintain our very high service standards. The online retail market is expanding rapidly with consumers now prepared to buy a much wider range of goods online. With Predict we have a product which gives retailers greater confidence that their goods can be delivered both on time and straight into the hands of their customers. That helps them improve their customer service and helps encourage more repeat purchases."