When COVID-19 began to expand well beyond the borders of China, economies throughout the world shutdown. But global delivery giant DHL leaned into innovation to make sure it could serve customers who were suddenly stuck at home. Now the company says business is better than ever, with demand exploding in its e-commerce division.
"We're experiencing right now peak season type volume," Mike Parra, CEO of DHL Express Americas, told Cheddar Monday. "As a matter of fact, when we took a look at our forecasting, the volume that we've seen really puts us in a 2022 position."
A vast majority of the shipments are business to consumer, Parra notes, adding that more than three-quarters of deliveries are to residential addresses.
While the pandemic forced the U.S. Postal Service to suspend service to dozens of regions around the world, DHL has been looking for opportunities to fill the void.
"Every day we're getting different news about different opportunities for us," Parra said. "We'll step in there and help those small to medium-sized customers that are looking to go global."
In addition to giving every employee a "Thank You" bonus of about $350 for working through the pandemic, DHL is also creating 2,000 more U.S. jobs.
"We just can't keep up with the demand that we're facing," Parra said, well aware that this stream of business is a good problem to have.
