Advent-backed Polish parcel locker group bets on UK

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free

Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.

InPost, a Polish parcel locker company backed by buyout firm Advent International, is betting on booming demand for out-of-home deliveries in the UK to drive its European expansion.

Rafał Brzoska, founder and chief executive of InPost, said the company could spend more than €1bn on acquisitions, though most of the growth would be organic. It is aiming to extend its network from nine countries to as many as 15 next year.

Brzoska said growth in out-of-home deliveries in Britain, where his ambitions will put him in competition with Czech billionaire investor Daniel Křetínský who bought Royal Mail in May, was faster than what he had experienced in Poland, where he started InPost in 2006.

“First-mover advantage is the key, but secondly the adoption [rate] among the [UK] clients is growing much faster than we expected and much faster than historically in Poland,” Brzoska said in an interview.

InPost’s expansion, backed by Advent after the private equity group bought a majority stake from Brzoska in 2017, has made its network of automated lockers the biggest in Europe. It has 25,000 so-called automatic parcel machines (APMs) in its home market.

In the UK, where InPost spent £60mn this year to take control of logistics company Menzies, it already has 8,600 APMs and is installing 100 more every week. Brzoska said he planned to increase that rate soon.

Dotted around towns and cities, APMs allow customers to pick up purchases from lockers when it suits them, rather than having to wait for a courier to deliver them to their address.

Courier companies reduce their costs, which they can pass on to customers, by delivering to dedicated points rather than individual homes. That also cuts the carbon intensity of their operations with fewer vehicles on the road.

InPost has a market valuation of €8.3bn, following a €2.8bn initial public offering in 2021. Advent now holds 11 per cent while Brzoska owns 12.5 per cent. Czech investment firm PPF Group has almost 29 per cent of the company, after buying part of Advent’s stake.

The company reported a 33 per cent rise in third-quarter earnings to almost €200mn, after growing the number of parcels delivered by 25 per cent more compared with the same period a year earlier.

Brzoska, 47, said he was not worried about competition in the UK from Křetínský, whom he described as “a very talented entrepreneur”, and others because “the size of the market and the total opportunity is so huge”.

Only about a tenth of parcels get collected outside customers’ homes in the UK, compared with 40 per cent in France and 65 per cent in Poland, he said.

InPost is now also negotiating with local partners to extend its cross-border deliveries to Germany, Switzerland and Austria, as well as separately to Nordic countries Finland, Sweden and Norway.

If the joint venture talks are successful, InPost will add either three or all six of the target countries to its network as early as the first quarter of 2025. A larger cross-border network will also help InPost compete against established courier companies such as DHL, UPS and FedEx.

“The old-fashioned door-to-door delivery system is not sustainable,” Brzoska said, adding that city authorities were promoting APMs over courier vans to reduce traffic congestion and pollution.

InPost recently launched a service for travellers to send luggage before boarding flights for the equivalent of €6.7 for a 25kg suitcase delivered from Poland to Spain, undercutting what many airlines charge.

The potential to make money from transporting travellers’ bags was highlighted last month when Spain fined some low-cost airlines for “abusive” practices, including extra costs for hand luggage.

But Brzoska conceded that most passengers would still prefer to travel with their bags even if it was the more expensive option.