Surge in parcel deliveries set to deliver 5,000 jobs at Evri

Evri plans to employ more than 5,000 additional workers in Britain as the parcels delivery boom shows no signs of slowing.

The hiring spree at the rapidly growing company will take the number of jobs created by Evri this year to more than 10,000.

It reflects the growth and increased volumes that the West Yorkshire-based business, previously named Hermes, has enjoyed in recent months, as well as a build-up to the busy Christmas period, which starts from Black Friday in late November.

Evri’s parcels volumes have risen sharply to above pre-pandemic levels amid record demand this summer. It delivered more than 2.5 million parcels every day in June and July.

Martijn de Lange, 45, its chief executive, said: “Ahead of the busy festive period, we are about to embark on the biggest recruitment programme in our history. This follows another significant year of growth, supported by continued growth from online retailing, including marketplaces and pre-loved sites, as customers increasingly look to buy and sell second-hand products.”

The jobs on offer include couriers, customer service roles and workers for its hubs and depots.

Evri, which began in Bradford in 1974 as Grattan Mail Order, delivers 730 million parcels each year, serving 12 million customers a week using 24,000 self-employed couriers, five hubs, 27 depots and 550 delivery units.

It works with more than 80 per cent of UK retailers and has benefited from the rise of marketplaces and pre-loved websites, such as Vinted and Etsy, on which people buy and sell second-hand items.

The company has tripled in size over the past five years and expects to double over the next five, driven by a combination of international expansion, growth in consumer-to-consumer parcels and business-to-consumer marketplace models. It is also supporting small and medium-sized companies with fulfilment and exports. It has opened depots in the United States, the Netherlands, and at Heathrow and in Basildon, Essex.

De Lange said customers increasingly expected delivery to ParcelShops within a ten-minute walk of their homes. Evri will have more than 15,000 locations by the end of this year, including in excess of 1,500 ParcelShops in Tesco stores, as well as lockers in independent small shops and newsagents.

In May it said that Amazon had made it an accredited Seller Fulfilled Prime carrier for its Prime service to deliver parcels on behalf of all merchants on its website, giving it the opportunity to grow its business by several million parcels a year. At the end of last year it secured an agreement with the Post Office to test in-branch parcel pick-ups.