The Hermes Fulfilment Group is adding another site to its network for the logistical processing of goods for OTTO and Mytoys. The online retailers want to ensure faster, more efficient processing of their goods in future and advance their plans to offer next-day delivery. The symbolic laying of the foundation stone officially marked the start of construction work for a new dispatch centre in the Polish town of Ilowa. The site will be specially equipped for logistical handling of low-volume product ranges such as clothing and toys. The new site in Ilowa is part of an investment programme worth several hundred million euros. With this, the Otto Group aims to reorganise the logistics processes for its retail subsidiaries OTTO and Mytoys and thus greatly improve the customer experience. This also includes a new facility in Gernsheim, Hesse, Germany. The Hermes Fulfilment Group will be in charge of both sites.
The logistics centre in the western Polish town of Ilowa, some 30 kilometres from the German border, will be built on a plot of land spanning 260,153 square metres. The proposed building complex will consist of nine halls with a combined area of 118,267 square metres. Hermes Fulfilment will employ 1,900 people at the new site to warehouse, pick and ship goods for OTTO and Mytoys. The Ilowa site will be used to supply end customers in Germany. The dispatch centre is scheduled for completion by the end of 2023.
In parallel with the construction of the new site in Ilowa, the location in Gernsheim, 20 kilometres south of Darmstadt, which until now has been the central logistics centre of Mytoys, will be expanded and reconfigured while continuing to operate. Work there is scheduled for completion in the first quarter of 2024. Both construction projects are intended to increase quantities of goods while meeting customer demand for faster delivery. The site with 1,000 employees currently handles around 25 million items per year. After its expansion, its capacity will increase to 70 million items per year.
The two sites in Ilowa and Gernsheim will operate in tandem and handle OTTO and Mytoys goods in equal measure. In future, the retailers aim to deliver the vast majority of orders within one day of placement. This will also be aided by the optimised processes within the logistics centres. “Increased automation of intralogistics will cut processing times. This will allow us to increase speed and efficiency, benefiting the customers by improving their shopping experience with shorter parcel processing times”, said Julia Hanebuth, manager of the overall project at Hermes Fulfilment. “Speed and quality of service are decisive competitive factors in e-commerce. Improving our logistics services will allow us to support the growth of OTTO and Mytoys over the long term.”
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