Frank Appel leaves when it’s most beautiful: The CEO of Deutsche Post DHL will speak again this Thursday at the general meeting of the Dax group in Bonn, after which he will hand over the top post to board member Tobias Meyer after 15 years. The successor had to present the figures for the first quarter on Wednesday – and as expected, they were mixed. The logistics company under Appel achieved the fourth best result in a row last year, and sales also reached a record. But now Swiss Post and its 600,000 employees worldwide are feeling the effects of the weaker economy.
The volumes in air and sea freight fell by almost a fifth compared to the same quarter of the previous year, and the number of shipments in the express division fell by five percent. These are the two most important areas of the group, which together are almost three times the size of the German letter and parcel business. The freight division’s sales have now shrunk by a quarter. Overall, group sales in the quarter fell by a good seven percent to 21 billion euros, and the bottom line was a third less profit at 911 million euros.
The future CEO Meyer said, however, that the company had “overall” met expectations with the results. After all, management had already warned when the annual figures for 2022 were presented that profits would fall due to the weakening economy.
Swiss Post has to pay its employees more
With regard to business in Germany, Meyer spoke somewhat awkwardly of a “quite challenging situation”. He is using this to describe the fact that warning strikes are having a negative impact on the letter and parcel division. The company was able to avert an indefinite strike by finally reaching an agreement with the Verdi union on a deal for the 160,000 employees in Germany. The contract is valid for two years until the end of 2024 and, according to Bonn, provides for wage increases of an average of 11.5 percent. The costs for additional staff during the strike weeks and for the higher wages amounted to 115 million euros in the first quarter.
Meyer said he will not change the company’s strategy for the time being. When asked if he was considering further acquisitions, he replied that the poor economic situation meant that companies were cheaper to buy, but such acquisitions had to move the group forward and be easy to integrate. Among other things, Deutsche Bahn is considering parting with its freight forwarding subsidiary Schenker. Meyer said that this egg had “been incubated several times” – in other words: the discussion about the separation is not new. You first have to see “if something is slipping”.