The new service enables customers to steer their parcels to one, preferred parcel machine in K Group stores. The service was piloted last March in Tampere, Finland. On Friday 26th of October, the new automated parcel terminals will be opened in Turku, Kirkkonummi, Tuusula, Porvoo and Tampere. Opening ceremonies will be held in K-Citymarket Kirkkonummi on Friday 26th of October starting at 1pm and in K-Citymarket Länsikeskus in Turku on Tuesday the 30th of October at 11 am. After the expansion, there will be eleven automated parcel terminals in Finland.
Smartmile’s automated parcel terminals are open and shared to all couriers. International courier DHL Express, DB Schenker and Finnish courier company Matkahuolto will deliver to the new machines.
“K Group actively develops services that help customers’ everyday life. K Group offers the largest network of postal and parcel services in 850 stores all over Finland. “The goal is to offer customers an easy and sustainable way to receive all of their parcels from one location” says K Group Director of Service Business Petri Toivonen.
“The pilot was a success in Tampere. We learned a lot from our customers and now we are ready to expand to new cities. We are working together with new partners to create a better customer experience for online buyers” says Smartmile’s CEO Aku Happo.
“Excellent customer experience is very important to Matkahuolto’s customers, so automated parcel terminals are naturally the next step in expanding our pickup point network. Therefore, we joined the cooperation with K Group and Smartmile. According to our surveys, more and more customers want to use automated parcel terminals” says Matkahuolto’s Business Manager Erkki Vehman.
Some of the automated parcel terminals are outdoors and will be operating 24 hours a day, enabling customers to receive their parcels at any time.
The customers benefit from being able to receive all of their parcels from one location and by being able to choose the most convenient time to pick up their parcels. At the same time, customers can do their grocery shopping.
The automated parcel terminals are manufactured by Konecranes. The robot inside the parcel terminal brings the parcels to one access point that meets the accessibility requirements. The height of the parcel terminals can be modified which enables larger storage capacity.
