Cooperation ELVIS establishes a lift truck network

The ELVIS Teilladungssystem GmbH is expanding its range of services and will also offer standardized deliveries via lift trucks starting from the new year. 50 ELVIS partners, who together possess over 800 lift trucks, have already joined the new network. The transports will be handled just like the partial load transports through the centrally located ELVIS hub in Knüllwald.

(Knüllwald) The new offering allows nationwide delivery to private end customers of goods weighing up to two tons and measuring up to 6.5 meters in length. “A look at the numbers shows: Online retail will remain a growth market for the foreseeable future. And not only are more and more orders being placed online, but also increasingly heavy and bulky goods. We are now addressing this with our new offering,” says Vanessa Klonnek, a member of the ELVIS management team. Specifically, it is a lift truck network that is affiliated with the ELVIS partial load system, and currently 50 ELVIS partners have already joined. The special feature is that not only business customers (B2B) are served, but also private end customers (B2C).

“For example, anyone buying a garden sauna or a greenhouse online today expects delivery right to the destination, namely the garden, and not just to the curb,” says Klonnek. “Such transports have often been inefficient in the past, as they require special equipment and could not be handled in a standardized way.” The result was long waiting times for consumers and high empty mileage rates for freight forwarders, who often had to send their lift truck vehicles on a journey for just one delivery. This was neither sustainable nor economical.

With the integration of the new lift truck network into the ELVIS partial load system, these disadvantages are eliminated. Goods weighing up to two tons and measuring a maximum of 6.5 meters can now be transported and delivered in a standardized manner.

Same process as with other partial loads

The principle behind it is the same as with other partial loads in the ELVIS system: The affiliated companies feed their deliveries daily into the ELVIS hub located conveniently near the A7 in Knüllwald and pick up goods from other partners there, which they then distribute in their home region. This way, both the specific transport costs, benefiting the freight forwarder, and the delivery times, benefiting the consumer, are reduced. Klonnek: “Even the retailer benefits because customer satisfaction increases.”

At the launch of the lift truck network in January next year, the delivery area will initially be limited to Germany. However, plans are already in place to serve routes to Austria, Switzerland, the Benelux countries, and Denmark in the future. This will ideally complement the existing systems for building materials logistics and the delivery of light and long shipments with the ELVIS Lancelot hand pallet truck.

Photo: © ELVIS