| UPS goes for gold – and without time-definite air service |
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UPS will be responsible for the pick-up and delivery of everything required to produce the Games, including warehousing, distribution, customs clearance, freight forwarding and courier services, as well as the logistics for the Olympic venues and village. Alan Williams, UPS’s Director of London 2012, intends to make the event the “greenest Games ever”, and is planning the supply chains with that in mind. There are three core areas UPS has identified for particular focus on sustainability. The first is road. Some of its 120- to150-strong fleet will be zero-emission vehicles. “A number of vehicles we are going to be using will be hybrid, electric or run on biofuel,” says Williams. The second area is rail and water. “Our warehouse in Tilbury, Essex, is next to the River Thames, so we want to see whether we can set up a supply chain via the river,” says Williams. “This doesn’t necessarily fit into the UPS model, because most of our deliveries are time-critical, but if we can show London that the Thames can be used as part of a sustainable supply chain, that for me is a very important legacy statement.” The third area UPS is focusing on is waste. “The organising committee has a commitment of 0% landfill. “Whenever you take stuff to a major event like this it means a lot of packaging, pallets, cardboard, shrinkwrap and so on. To make sure we create no landfill, we will recycle everything. “For example we are warehousing about 15,000 computers. When we take them into the venues we will store the packaging. After the Games, we will bring it back to the venues so the PCs can be repacked in the original boxes and returned to the warehouses.” “By 2012, UPS will be operating nearly 100,000sq metres of warehousing to support the Games,” says Williams. The warehouse in Tilbury also has a rail connection that could be used to move everything necessary for the football competition to stadiums in Glasgow, Newcastle, Manchester and Cardiff. Although London 2012 is slightly bigger, logistically, than the 2008 Beijing Olympics, financially, it isn’t UPS’s biggest contract. “But in terms of profile, it’s right up there,” says Williams. In January 2012, UPS will begin moving inventory into the venues, and by December, everything must be gone and the warehouses shut. “The peak time for movement is June/July. When the games start it will be a quieter period for us, and we start a replenishment stage,” explains Williams. “Then, between when the Olympics end and the Paralympic Games begin, there is another peak, because we are pumping-out materials from the Olumpics and pumping-in Paralympics inventory. “Our busiest time is probably when the Games finish, because you have got the equipment and furniture we took in the venues from our warehouses, plus you have other inventory that went directly to the venues and which will come back to the warehouses. “The flat-pack furniture for the Athletes’ Village will be brought in from Asia to Tilbury. If there are 18,000 athletes and officials, then we have to assemble 18,000 beds and 18,000 wardrobes, and make all the rooms ready – that in itself is a huge logistics activity. It will take about three months to do that,” explains Williams. UPS estimates that by the end of 2012, it will have handled more than 30 million Olympics items. The operator has already decided its criterion for success at the historic event, says Williams. “If nobody knows we were there, it means we got everything right.” Source: IFW, September 06, 2010 Remark: Would you have answerered that UPS’ core activities as the logistics provider for the Olympic games are road, rail, water and waste? You have to watch “Big Brown” differently in the future…(ds) |
