State Post Bureau: The utilization rate of smart express lockers will remain stable from March to September 2024

The "Double 11" shopping festival is about to begin, and the express delivery business is experiencing a blowout. The "massive" packages also put pressure on the delivery of couriers. The "Express Delivery Market Management Measures" implemented on March 1 this year require that companies operating express delivery businesses shall not confirm the receipt of express parcels on behalf of users without their consent, and shall not deliver express parcels to smart express boxes, express service stations and other express terminal service facilities without authorization.

With the implementation of new regulations, the rate of couriers visiting homes has increased. Are the smart express lockers that were previously popular in urban neighborhoods gradually falling out of favor?

Smart express lockers were created to solve the problem of express delivery at the end of the delivery process. In 2010, China Post installed the first express locker in China. In 2014, the number of smart express lockers in China was 15,000 sets, which increased to 60,000 sets in 2015 and reached more than 400,000 sets in 2019, with an average compound growth rate of 93% over the past five years.

After more than ten years of development, the smart express locker industry has now formed a tripartite structure dominated by e-commerce platforms, express delivery companies, and third-party operators.

Many smart express locker operating companies said that the phenomenon of locker withdrawal has been increasing in recent years, and the impact of the new express delivery regulations is only secondary. There are three main reasons:

——In the past few years, the scale of installation has increased sharply, but the rate of entry into cabinets has declined and the frequency of use has decreased. Feedback to the enterprise level, although the scale has expanded, the profit has declined, and many enterprises have suffered losses. If they want to "survive", it is inevitable to appropriately remove and consolidate express cabinets.

——Express delivery lockers are placed in residential areas, buildings and other places, and the property management needs to pay water, electricity and site fees. In addition, the express delivery lockers need to be repaired and upgraded after aging and damage, and the operating costs are rising.

——The willingness of couriers and recipients to use the service is declining. The operators of smart express lockers charge couriers 0.2 to 0.5 yuan per order, squeezing their income. At the same time, they charge recipients for overtime storage fees.

Many couriers said that the delivery fee for each express delivery is about 1 yuan. After the implementation of the new regulations, they are more willing to choose door-to-door delivery or deliver the package to express stations.

Since the end of October, some e-commerce platforms have started to hold shopping festivals, which has brought the express delivery peak earlier. The State Post Bureau predicts that this round of express delivery business peak season will start at the end of October this year and is expected to last until before the Spring Festival in 2025.

Compared with smart express lockers, the express delivery stations that have emerged in recent years are more popular among the public in solving the problem of last-mile delivery.

Taking Cainiao Express as an example, it currently handles more than 80 million parcels per day and has more than 170,000 stations.

Several couriers revealed that the post station charges low fees to couriers and the collection operation is very simple. Couriers can collect the couriers in the same area in advance and deliver them directly to the post station in the area. Compared with smart express lockers, the post station does not require couriers to scan the package information one by one, nor does it require waiting in line, and can deliver large quantities in a short time. More importantly, the post station does not charge the recipient for overtime storage fees, which is more popular among the public.

Xu Junjun, deputy director of the YTO Development Research Center, said that the elderly who cannot operate smart express lockers prefer post stations. Moreover, through centralized collection and distribution, express delivery is delivered to consumers. Consumers do not need to fill in detailed home addresses during online shopping. They only need to choose the post station closest to them as the delivery address. Post stations reduce the risk of consumers' personal information leakage.

Fengchao, a company that ranks high in the express delivery locker market share, said that as of May 31, the number of Fengchao lockers was 330,200, an increase of 15,000 from 2023, and continued to grow after the new express delivery regulations were implemented.

Xu Hang, senior manager of Fengchao's market operations department, said that the partial withdrawal of lockers was based on the analysis of the big data system. By optimizing the layout of lockers, the utilization rate can be increased. As of May 31, the number of parcels delivered through Fengchao's terminal this year was 2.76 billion, covering about 209,000 communities in 31 provinces across the country.

Xu Hang believes that due to the diverse needs of users, express lockers and express stations are two models for solving the last-mile delivery problem. Both have their own strengths and weaknesses, and it is difficult to simply judge the pros and cons.

Monitoring data from the State Post Bureau showed that the new express delivery regulations came into effect on March 1 this year. Compared with the previous two months, the box delivery rate (the proportion of express parcels delivered using smart express lockers to the total express delivery volume in the industry) from March to September showed no significant fluctuations, and the overall performance was stable.

From Xinhua News Agency