21.6 million: that’s how many parcels Swiss Post delivered between Black Friday and Christmas

Year after year, it’s the most intensive period for Swiss Post: its employees have processed around one million parcels every day since Black Friday. And the parcels landed under customers' Christmas trees in good time. On Monday, 18 December, Swiss Post even delivered around 1.2 million parcels, the single-day record for this year. In total during the run-up to Christmas, Swiss Post sorted 21.6 million parcels in the sorting centers, delivered them to all regions of Switzerland and sorted them for delivery abroad. That’s 3 percent less than during the same period last year. Subdued consumer confidence means that fewer parcels are being sent. Nevertheless, the figures are still well above the average daily volumes for the rest of 2023. The quantity of letters has also fallen slightly: last year, around 14 million letters were sent per day, but this year, mail carriers have delivered around 13 million letters, newspapers and promotional mailings each day since Black Friday.

Swiss Post was prepared to make sure every parcel arrived in time for Christmas

Swiss Post was well prepared to ensure it could process all letters and parcels in the required quantities. For this reason, it opened three new parcel centers in 2023 to guarantee capacity. The regional centers in Pratteln, Wallisellen and Härkingen further relieved the strain on the large centers, and the daily sorting capacity is around 20 percent higher throughout Switzerland compared to last year. Additional measures have contributed to sharing the burden across as many shoulders as possible. For example, during the Christmas period, Swiss Post hired around 500 additional temporary staff members and rented 330 delivery vans. But that’s not all. The conveyor belts in the large parcel centers at Daillens, Härkingen and Frauenfeld were up and running from Black Friday until Christmas for up to 22 hours per day. The norm is 18 hours. Mail carriers also delivered letters and parcels on 400 additional rounds per day. And last but not least, Swiss Post employees sorted parcels on Saturdays, too. Johannes Cramer, Head of Logistics Services and Member of Executive Management at Swiss Post, says: “Thanks to our employees’ impressive commitment, we have been able to ensure that parcels and Christmas cards arrived at our customers in good time for Christmas. I would like to thank everyone who made this possible.”