The massive change coming to Australia Post as customers embrace online shopping revolution
- Australia Post could soon deliver seven days a week as online shopping surges
- The postal service is considering the move to keep up with increased demand
- Victoria broke its record for online shopping, with a 161 per cent increase
Australia Post could soon deliver seven days a week as the coronavirus pandemic continues to drive online shopping sales.
Gary Starr, Australia Post’s executive general manager, said the postal service will likely go ahead with the move to keep up with the increased demand.
‘In terms of consumer trends, [seven-day delivery] is something I think over time will become a reality. As we see growth in online shopping in the years to come, I believe it will become something we do more often, if not full time,’ he told The Age.
Australians have been receiving packages on weekends since April when lockdown closed all in-store retail outlets.
Australia Post could soon deliver seven days a week as the coronavirus pandemic continues to drive online shopping sales
The postal service is considering the move to keep up with the increased demand
Demand has since slowly declined, but Mr Starr said posties are still delivering on weekends to residents in Melbourne, where there has been a high volume of orders due to its second lockdown.
Last week Victoria broke its record for online shopping, with a 161 per cent increase in purchases compared to the same week in 2019.
Sydney saw a 73 per cent bump, Brisbane was up 65 per cent and Perth increased 51 per cent in online shopping.
Food and alcohol, health and beauty, and home and gardening goods have been the most popular categories for purchases.
‘People got a taste for it in April, and now they are much more comfortable buying online. It’s quite amazing,’ Mr Starr said.
Australia Post has also set up 16 pop-up parcel sorting facilities nationwide to cope with the amount of online orders.
The service even chartered several additional Qantas planes to distribute the huge influx of packages.
Despite the boom, Australia Post – which is owned by the government – is likely to see ‘modest’ earnings due to a downturn in letters.
It now delivers letters ever second day in metropolitan areas.
‘There’s no question that we’ve seen significant growth and volumes in the parcel business, but at the same time we’ve seen an acceleration and in the decline of mail. So it’s been a bit of a two-speed year,’ Mr Starr said.
Last week Victoria broke its record for online shopping, with a 161 per cent increase in purchases compared to the same week in 2019