Gebrüder Weiss grows to EUR 1.55 billion annual net sales
Gebrüder Weiss (GW), the international transport and logistics service provider headquartered in Lauterach in Vorarlberg, grew strongly in 2017. With preliminary net sales of around EUR 1.55 billion, the previous year’s result was exceeded by around 14 per cent, the group informs in a press release.
Apart from the good economic situation, the regional expansions in Europe, Asia and North America as well as the company’s most recent acquisition in southern Germany were decisive factors for the positive development. In total, Gebrüder Weiss invested around EUR 65 million to expand its network in 2017, thus doubling the investment volume compared with the previous year (2016: EUR 32.7 million).
“With future-oriented investments into locations, infrastructure and personnel, 2017 was an outstanding year for the group,” says Wolfgang Niessner, Chief Executive Officer of Gebrüder Weiss. “We want to deliver consistent quality standards in logistics to our customers worldwide. We have come a good deal closer to this claim. In particular, the land transport and logistics solutions sector performed excellently, increasing sales by 15.6 per cent to EUR 1.04 billion in a competitive environment.”
The equity ratio increased again slightly to 59 per cent. The number of employees increased year-on-year by 4.7 per cent to 6,724 full-time equivalents at 150 company-owned sites.
The expansion of the network was accompanied by an expansion of the service range. “Mastering the entire logistics chain gives many global companies a decisive competitive advantage,” explains Wolfgang Niessner. That is why Gebrüder Weiss acts for a growing number of customers not merely as a classic transport company. Rather, industry-specific logistics solutions are needed today.
For this reason, the company has set up its own Competence Clusters for the high-tech and automotive sectors, which analyse the special requirements of these industries and develop holistic solutions for them. In addition to classic warehousing, procurement and distribution logistics, services for technology companies also include security concepts and technical distribution, including the installation of big electronic devices. The automotive service portfolio includes, among other things, just-in-time deliveries directly to the plant, in-house logistics and coverage of transnational regions as regional freight forwarders.
The area of home delivery is also growing. The Gebrüder Weiss product named GW pro.line home offers comprehensive logistics services to end customers. Above all, electrical and furniture retailers, as well as e-commerce companies were taking advantage of these services last year. Handling around 300,000 shipments, the logistics service provider was able to maintain its position as the Austrian market leader in this business segment in 2017. In addition to Austria, the GW pro.line home service is currently being rolled out in the Czech Republic, Serbia, Croatia, Hungary and Slovakia.