Yahoo Finance Polish locker giant to invest £100m in its UK operation
Poland’s “locker king” is targeting Britain with a £100m investment as he seeks to cash in on the surge in online retailing.
Rafal Brzoska is aiming to install 10,000 of the company’s “automated parcel machines” in the UK by 2023, allowing shoppers to pick up goods they have ordered from railway stations and supermarkets using a key code.
His company, InPost, already has 1,500 lockers in high-footfall areas.
Mr Brzoska launched his firm in Poland 15 years ago. More than 60pc of Poland’s population is now within a seven-minute walk of one of its 12,000 devices. His business has made him one of Poland’s youngest billionaires. He said: “Britain has the most advanced e-commerce market in Europe, we want to be a part of that.”
InPost said that online retailers can secure major savings by using a locker. Around 70pc of the cost of getting products into consumers’ hands is spent on the “last mile” of courier runs, it said.
In Poland, the company has partnerships with 26,000 online retailers and is striking deals with UK businesses. Agreements have so far been put in place with Boohoo, Missguided, New Look and Schuh.
The company, which floated in Amsterdam in January with an €8bn (£7bn) valuation, will initially target London, Manchester and Birmingham before spreading to other cities.
InPost has signed a logistics deal with delivery firm Hermes to service its lockers. The company faces competition from behemoth Amazon. However, Mr Brzoska believes that merchants will seek competitors to the online giant, and that InPost is agnostic about whose parcels its lockers hold.
