Now that trade is starting up again in September and the vacation period has not quite ended, many service providers in transport and logistics are facing the challenge of maintaining adequate staffing. Royal FloraHolland is also pulling out all the stops to achieve a good logistic result for its customers.
The economy is strong and unemployment has fallen to 3.5% according to the Dutch central government. This means that unemployment is currently at its lowest level since 2001. Although there are still Dutch people looking for work, this is low from a historical perspective. Many users of the marketplace are consequently noticing difficulties in finding sufficient personnel, especially on Mondays and Fridays, which are the busiest days of the week. This may affect the logistic performance and the operations of customers.
Logistic performance stable
Despite these challenges, Royal FloraHolland's performance has remained stable over the recent period. Yme Pasma, COO of Royal FloraHolland: "The logistic performance was kept up to standard during the summer months. Even so, we are seeing the effects of the scarcity on the labor market in combination with the thriving trade and the time of year. Until July, we achieved the promised lead time in 96.2% of the transactions. This percentage fell slightly to 96.0% in August. Some of our customers may have noticed this on certain days."
Preparing for the fall peak period
Employers have to be increasingly creative to realize staffing levels. Royal FloraHolland also took various measures during the summer period and is pulling out all the stops in September in order to perform optimally and to be well prepared for the fall peak in the second half of October 2019.
Source: Royal FloraHolland