ACCORDING to the Pitney Bowes Parcel Shipping Index, Australians shipped 934m parcels in 2019, with an average of 37 parcels shipped per person.
The global technology company’s annual report found that global parcel volume surpassed 100bn in 2019 for the first time, reaching 103bn.
The research found that Australians shipped 8% more parcels year-on-year and e-commerce retail sales grew by 4% year-on-year to reach US $15.7bn in 2019, making Australia the 10th largest e-commerce market worldwide.
Stephen Darracott, vice president and country manager, Pitney Bowes Japan, Australia and New Zealand, said, “Unsurprisingly, shipping volumes and revenue continue to grow in Australia”.
“When we break down the 934m parcels sent throughout 2019, that equates to an average of more than 2.5m parcels each day and more than 106,000 per hour or 1777 per minute or 30 per second,” Mr Darracott said.
Mr Darracott said the spike in e-commerce was driven by the popularity of sales events and marketplaces, the introduction of ‘buy now pay later’ payment options, affordable logistics and faster deliveries with next business day deliveries growing significantly at 21% year-on-year.
“In 2020, the pandemic has completely changed the way Australians live and work, and it is driving a further push towards online shopping. Pitney Bowes’ own product developments and partnerships are geared towards providing innovative solutions that can improve and simplify our customers’ business processes,” he said.
“We’re soon launching a new online parcel sending platform, which will let businesses simply manage all shipping in one place, from their computer.”
The latest report reveals growth of 17.7% in 2019 in the world’s 13 major markets, in line with the 17-28% growth projection range given in previous Parcel Shipping Index reports.
On average, 3,248 parcels were shipped every second in 2019 in the world’s 13 major markets, equating to an average of 27 parcels shipped per person.
China remains the strongest influence on the market with 63.5bn parcels shipped in 2019 and an increase of 26% in parcel volume year-over-year. Excluding China, parcel volume increased by 6.7%, from 37bn in 2018 (including Amazon Logistics volume in the US) to 39bn in 2019. Global parcel revenue increased by 9% year-over-year from $323bn in 2018 to $351bn in 2019, at a CAGR of 11% during 2013-19.
The report forecasts parcel volume is most likely to more than double and reach 220-262bn parcels by 2026, with a 14.8% CAGR for 2020-2024.
