As more people look to turn a profit from their pre-loved goods on eBay and Vinted, volumes for Yodel’s Customer to Customer (C2C) delivery service have surged exponentially, with the independent parcel carrier now delivering almost 600,000 parcels a week, a 132% increase since July 2022.
A strong rise in the number of people selling items online has contributed to the spike in parcel volumes, with people making more use of marketplaces such as Vinted and eBay, says the company. This trend could be set to continue as more people plan to give pre-loved gifts for Christmas.
According to Yodel’s research of 19,000 people, almost 2 in 5 (39%) of UK consumers are looking to online marketplaces for gifts this Christmas, showing a steady growth in this area.
Yodel has invested in its C2C technology and infrastructure in recent years, and the rise in parcel volumes has been supported by the introduction of print in store labels across the nationwide network of thousands of Yodel serviced out of home drop off and collection points.
The Yodel Direct service offers Store to Store and Store to Door services for customers sending parcels weighing up to 10kg.
Mike Hancox, CEO of Yodel, explains: “Much of the growth in volumes we have seen from Yodel Direct has been driven by the growing numbers of people selling online to boost their income. We have also seen micro sellers that began operating during the pandemic continuing to do so since, further driving the success of our C2C deliveries.
“In the coming year, we expect to see greater integration of technology into our services to further improve customer experience. We have appointed a dedicated Out of Home Director to lead on expanding our offering; a key focus for us as we look to provide greater convenience for customers to collect and post their parcels at a time that suits them.”
The ongoing shift of consumers towards online shopping has also seen B2C parcel volumes continuing to grow. Volumes for recipe boxes that spiked 173% during the pandemic have continued to rise since (73%), while volumes in fashion parcels have increased by 63% year-to-date.
Yodel’s customer service operations have also seen further investment due to the business’ sustained growth. The customer app now provides two-hour delivery windows and provides customers with delivered images, which are also being shared with clients via the eRin service, causing a 47% fall in the number of queries resulting in driver interviews. The time taken for end-to-end resolution of customer queries has also fallen by almost 50%.
