Industry leaders throughout Europe came together at DELIVER 2022 to discuss the issues and solutions around sustainability and circularity, gender diversity and last mile delivery, meeting rapidly rising customer expectations and more. 1,500 senior e-commerce and logistic experts from leading vendors, retailers and media across 40 countries, met at Europe’s flagship e-commerce event to accelerate change and lead the way in the future of the industry.
DELIVER 2022 attracted over 800 C-and D-level retailers, 130 logistics vendors, leading global industry media, and facilitated 5,000 one-to-one meetings. Attending retail decision-makers included IKEA, ASOS, Max Mara, eBay, Renault, Whirlpool, Camper, Vinted, Oatly, Unilever, Amazon, PepsiCo, Inditex and Samsung.
The diverse and exciting roster of keynotes featured insights from some of the most important and influential names in e-commerce and logistics; and the vendors attending included leading innovators such as Paack, GLS, Spring/PostNL, Asendia, Colissimo, DPDgroup, InPost, Maersk and Mondial Relay.
“I’m glad to be here, to talk to vendors and see what solutions are available to our industry” confirmed Darija Pizent, Director of Supply Chain Management, Atlantic Grupa.
Sustainability – a necessity to survive
With 20+ years experience in retail, Marissa Selfa, CEO, North Sails highlighted in her keynote that sustainability and circularity are relevant for all businesses, including fashion, the second most polluting industry in the world. She called on organisations to work in a more sustainable way.
“Sustainability is inconvenient but it forces us to look at business in a different way. We need to phase out substances of concern, increase clothing utilisation and improve recycling….”.
Selfa told the audience of senior retailers: “Fashion is one of the least sustainable industries in the world.” However, the current North Sails collection is made up of 95% sustainable materials.
Sustainability is no longer nice to have, it’s necessary to survive, Caterina Occhio, CSR and Sustainability Advisor at luxury fashion house Maison Alaia, reported in her session.
More diverse and inclusive organisations are also more profitable
DELIVER is a member of HeForShe, the UN Women Solidarity Movement for Gender Equality. As such, the DELIVER 2022 speaker programme features a gender-diverse group of e-commerce leaders to showcase their achievements.
Danone’s Global Head of Diversity and Inclusion, Putri Realita, presented the company’s diversity and inclusion journey it launched six years ago, ‘Diversity is getting invited to the party, inclusion is getting asked to dance. The business case for ID is compelling’, she added; and noted a McKinsey report, which showed more diverse and inclusive organisations were also more profitable. In partnership with HeForShe, Danone launched its Global Gender-Neutral Parental Policy, offering a consistent standard of support to all parents-to-be employed across the world – 100,000+ employees across 55 countries.
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Same day delivery forecast to double in demand
A Workshop Studio session at DELIVER featuring Matthew Blackhurst-Evans, Digital Project Lead at Lush; Tom Anastasi, Director of Sales Northern Europe at delivery and fulfilment platform Bringg and Graham Smith, Strategic Account Director at last mile delivery network Gophr. They discussed how customers are willing to pay more for same-day delivery and it’s becoming more important than next-day delivery for customers at Lush, which has rolled out this service to 50 stores this year alone.
According to Seb Robert, Gophr CEO, same-day is a growing area and forecast to double over the next four years, largely by cannibalising share from next-day. There is also a growing awareness among retailers of the need to compete with Amazon Prime and Prime Now, he said.
This is key since price or the cost of same-day is the number one issue for supply chain directors. Other challenges of same-day include coverage, the technology stack, plus in-store operations – training staff in terms of pick and pack in order to get products ready for a courier.
Stephane Tomczak, CEO, DELIVER highlighted, ‘I am thankful to the delegates from all over Europe for spending the time with us to discuss the most pertinent issues affecting the ecosystem, and coming here to find solutions and discover the cutting edge of the supply chain. The team is now looking forward to the opportunities that DELIVER will bring to the global e-commerce community in 2023 and beyond.”
