To support this renewal and transformation process, Posti has started to focus more on strategic partnerships with selected innovative companies that can provide value to their operations. The number of suppliers has actively been reduced to improve quality and to assure cost improvements in the future.
At K.Hartwall we always work hard to support the current operations but also innovate to find the best new solutions to our customers’ logistics problems. We were therefore delighted when Posti, as one of the main postal operators in the Nordics, selected us as their strategic partner for the future.
The new cooperation has started this year with the supply of 6,000 roll cages from our Söderkulla factory to support the current Posti operations of delivering everything from letters, parcels up to bigger items like household appliances.
“To find a cost-effective and innovative domestic partner is a double win for us. It means that we can ensure the quality and reliability of the products but also increase the flexibility for long-term development of our load carriers”, says Posti’s Sourcing Manager, Jan Malmberg.
Posti also want to develop the load carrier fleet and related processes to meet their future needs, this includes e.g. temperature-controlled deliveries or tracking of the roll cages as many of them get lost on the way back to the terminals.
“K. Hartwall is more than a supplier to us,” adds Jan. “They are doing more than just roll containers. Together, we can find and develop solutions to our changing needs. The fact that K.Hartwall is just behind the door allows also to meet often, do quality checks and develop fast new ideas which can be first tested on a smaller scale. We would not be able to act in such a flexible way with a supplier abroad”.
Another development project is piloting of cost efficient tracking solutions. “We will in the near future identify and test a variety of tracking techniques that utilise, for example RFID, NFC or Bluetooth technology to track our load carriers. The aim is to achieve better control of the fleet in order to ensure that the right amount of load carriers are in the right place at the right time. Reducing the waste of load carriers is also an important issue for Posti as it has direct impact on costs”, comments Jan.
One of the main concerns for Posti is the Total Cost of Ownership of their load carriers and especially to ensure a cost-efficient repair and maintenance process. Again this is an area where the transparent cooperation between Posti, K.Hartwall and the repair workshop will be crucial to achieve better planning of operations and further improvements.
