More Food Logistics in North Germany
DACHSER is building a new Food Logistics terminal in Hamburg. The ground-breaking ceremony was attended by VIPs from the worlds of politics and business.
Typically murky Hamburg weather accompanied the ground-breaking ceremony for DACHSER’s new Food Logistics facility on 26 March on the Allermöhe industrial estate. This did not dampen the good mood of the occasion, however. Hamburg’s senator for economics and labour, Axel Gedaschko, and the chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Logistics Initiative Hamburg, Prof. Dr Peer Witten, were enthusiastic about DACHSER’s commitment to the Hamburg economic region. In their speeches, they commended the logistics provider as one of the few companies that is continuing to look optimistically to the future despite the current recession. “This attitude will pay off in the medium to long term,” Gedaschko said. “Like DACHSER, the city of Hamburg is also investing counter-cyclically.” DACHSER management spokesman Bernhard Simon stressed: “When times are hard, our sustainable business policy pays off: we plan for the long term and reinvest our profits instead of paying out dividends. DACHSER itself was also founded in 1930 in the wake of the Great Depression. Every crisis also has a silver lining.”
In the coming weeks, the new transshipment terminal, for which DACHSER is investing 18.5 million euros in the Hanseatic city, will be built just a few hundred metres from the present site in Hamburg-Allermöhe. The location close to the A1, A7 and A24 motorways as well as the proximity to Hamburg city centre had already proved ideal after the logistics centre opened in 2004. The positive development in the order situation in the years that followed has now – just five years on – made it necessary to expand.
The acquisition of the Tank Group in July 2008 was an important milestone in DACHSER’s plans to massively expand the Food Logistics business segment in the north. “The new construction project on the almost 35,000-square-metre site is the logical continuation of this strategy,” explained Gerhard Riester, managing director of DACHSER Food Logistics. “With this step, we have now also created a balance between north and south in the Food Logistics business segment.” It is also planned to consolidate operational activities of DACHSER and Tank in and around Hamburg at the end of 2009, one month after moving in to the new premises. The location also serves as an important logistics platform for Scandinavia.
Covering 5,600 square metres, the transshipment area will be more than twice its present size. The 61 bays will be fitted with interior gatehouses, sectional doors down to the ground and inflatable door seals – a standard introduced at DACHSER Food Logistics in 2005 for all new buildings. This technology currently sets standards industry-wide when it comes to energy efficiency and hygiene at the interfaces between transshipment warehouse and truck. By securing access to an adjacent piece of land, DACHSER is keeping its options open to build an additional new warehouse.
overview eLetter 02/2009
