Australia Post today recorded a $281million profit, up 16.6 per cent.
It's traditional mail business is down, if fact it saw a $148million loss. That's no surprise. When was the last time you licked a 60 cent postage stamp, yes it's 60 cents now, and dropped off an envelope in the mail?
On the flip side, when was the last time you waited for a parcel?
That's where the growth in Australia Post's business is coming from.
It's parcels and retail division saw an 8.5 per cent increase in revenue, helping profit to climb to $546million.
Online shopping is driving this trend.
Local consumers spent almost $12billion in online stores last year, an increase of 22 per cent.
Despite the doom and gloom predicted by some local retailers, Australia Post says 70 per cent of the items sold online, are bought from Australian online stores.
The challenge for Australia Post is to be able to meet this growing demand, and be able to deliver these goods more effectively and efficiently.
That's why it's spending $2billion to update its infrastructure systems.
New technology will mean easier tracking of parcels, and investment in 24/7 parcel lockers.
By 2014, the company aims to see 80 per cent of Australians in metro areas be within 10 minutes' drive of an after hours parcel collection location.
For Australia Post though, its immediate focus will be on Christmas, where it will deliver more than 3 million parcels in the month of December.
One big change that consumers will see, is that parcels will be delivered in November and December along with extended opening hours for parcel collections at retail outlets.
