Hello and welcome everybody to the next edition of our Investor Relations series, Experience Excellence Simply Delivered. So, in the technical setup proven before, we are happy to have the same express experts starring than the last time around. So we've got the CEO of the Express division, John Pearson and Mikael Graven and Lander van Delf from the sales team who are going to introduce you to the exciting world of B2B, e commerce. As you see on the slides that we provided to you, this is in fact the 5th edition of our tutorial series. Last time around, we shed a bit light on how B2B B2C e Commerce is actually working wonderfully for our network.
And today, we are going to take a look at B2B and promise There is more to come in terms of Investor Relations tutorial. So just a brief summary of the key takeaways, what you're going to Learn over the next 60 or so minutes. I think we have shown in the past that Express is able to deal with e commerce definitely in the B2C arena where we have seen a rapid constant expansion of B2Cecom volumes in the network in a way that allowed the margin indeed to expand simultaneously. So today is about the next growth vertical, e commerce in B2B, which is another very good fit to the TDI network that we're operating around the world. And therefore, due to popular demand, we decided, let's take a deeper look on how e commerce works in B2B and how our Express network is going to be instrumental in that.
And without any Further ado, I'm going to show you quickly how the Q and A is working. You see on the webcast to that one field, Will you please punch in your questions and they will be then coming up to me here And I will read out the questions and that's the plan for the next 60 minutes. So With that, over to you, John.
Thank you very much. And I'll just sit on that slide for a second before I turn over. So good morning and good afternoon. I think it's probably the most appropriate greeting. Dealing with e commerce, That's the words Martin used, and I think that's absolutely right, demonstrating that DP DHL and indeed, in this case, DHL Express I have a strong competency and capability to deal with this commercial growth opportunity that has been In front of us for a number of years.
And I remember in October 2016, doing a physical virtual tutorial in London. Some of you would have been there with my colleagues in the other division showcasing a little bit the story of e commerce and how we Treat it as a vertical. And then we launched our little bit of history is, I think, interesting and relevant. We launched our B2C 21st Century Spice Trade at the beginning of 'seventeen. And then in close succession, in fact, Early in 'eighteen, we released B2B, the Next Industrial Revolution.
And this slide that you see now Precipitates the sort of renewal, I guess, because of the pandemic and how things have moved, which my colleagues will talk about, into what we're really seeing now. So with that, I'll go on to my next slide, which I take my hat off to my Previous colleague, Ken Allen and GMB that I sat on and 4 pillars, 3 letters and a passport is the lexicon of And the language of BHL Express keeping a very simple agenda that absolutely gets through to all our frontline people And that people are the absolute drivers of growth and quality. Quality, a leading indicator and growth is a lagging indicator. When I took the chair from Ken towards Back end of 2018 and officially started at the beginning of 2019. We extended that and extracted, I guess, you could say, we extracted some Points which we wanted higher emphasis on are supervisory and supervisory excellence, A program driving the capability and the competence, to use the phrase again, of everyone that manages the people that don't manage people our frontline and that continues to be extremely important.
I'll hop over the next one into efficiency Digitalization created by efficiency and most recently, the whole sustainability story has come to A rapid form of life in our group and the ability for our entire organization to start driving the pillars of E, the pillars of S and the pillars of G through to the front line, through to our customers and all the areas that we need to do that. But the highlighted figure E commerce there in bold forms a big part of our commercial strategy. It has done, as I've just explained, through our history over the last 5 years and even more so now as Mikael will talk to, and it takes up a big part of our Focus 20 And with that, I'll hop on to the next slide where it answers a few questions and tells you what we're doing a We treat B2C as a vertical in the sense of a vertical of engineering and manufacturing, technology, Oil and Gas, shipping and banking, our very first vertical. We wrapped ancillary services like on demand We're giving our consumers the choice where they would like to take delivery. And so it is with B2B.
It's a vertical that sits within the vertical, if you will. And we're seeing rapid growth and rapid interest. And I think if any company had been wondering when to invest in B2B Online capability, the question has been answered for them in the sense that now It's absolutely the time and now is even perhaps 6 or 12 months later than many. You'll see on the bubbles there that the Share of our shipments, which is on several months in the last 12 months, closer to 50 than 45. So 1 in 2 shipments are an e commerce shipment of 1 type or another.
And you will see at one Level, prima facie that our margin has improved over the time that e commerce has been a real source of growth. In fact, There are a couple of slides later that we'll talk to that in a little bit more detail as to how the last mile has just got easier and easier. So it fits in with our commercial capabilities. The slides that will follow from here on in talk through exactly that and demonstrate it with authenticity. And it's certainly something that next two gentlemen that will present are living in the middle of.
And I think that's valid in the sense that, As they say, e commerce is the commerce and we're moving quickly in it. We're investing highly in terms of human capital and intelligence as well as aviation resources and quality. In fact, not 1 minute or $1 that we spend On the online world is goes to waste. So with that, I'll pass over to Mikael. And once again, I thank you for your interest in this topic and our company.
Thank you very much, John. Let me see if I can take the control. Yes. So good day from my side. Thank you very much, John.
Before we start to talk In detail about B2B e Commerce, I think it's good to define exactly what do we mean with B2B e commerce. People in general would say it's an online order transaction between businesses via an online sales portal, but we would like to specify that a little bit more. So yes, business to business where the full transaction meaning including the payment and the shipping is facilitated online via transactional website without the need to become a customer or maybe to wait before a salesperson is actually reaching out to you. So in other words, As a business, can I actually place an order immediately without interfering with a sales rep? And on the next slide, it is actually presented a very good Example, it's called Mr.
Worker. It's an Italian SME. It's at the moment purely B2B. And maybe Frank, if you can run the video. And the question is, on this specific website, Can you buy 5 the world's tabletop nitrous sauce within 30 seconds?
And here you see it already navigating through the different products. It has a bit of feel of an original B2C website. You can click, you can change, you can Change the quantities, you can look at the different products. There's actually some marketing segment where they promote other products that can go with that. And this is very efficient.
It's very smooth. And it's giving you hopefully a very good example of what we mean with a very good example of a B2B cycle. So to the investor community, there's always An important question popping up and Martin and also John was already referring to it. And the question is, now we know what we mean by B2B e commerce, is that actually a good fit with the Press industry. And for sure, when we talk about B2B buyers, They expect the same customer experience in terms of quality, reliability, in terms of speed, in terms of convenience, but there's another very important element to it.
If you talk about the traditional B2B distribution channel would run quite frequently through distributors, importers and agents. So you would have like a central point production facility or a central warehouse facility from where big orders are shipped to local importers, local distributors who would then Sell the products locally and would also manage obviously the transportation domestically. With the B2B e commerce that actually is changing because it offers a business the opportunity to deal directly with the customer in the different countries. So what does that mean? That means for the Express industry, It means that we can ship more orders, more repeated orders and most likely also more cross border orders.
So smaller, more volume, cutting out the middlemen, which means basically for our customers, the businesses, more margins so that they can afford express deliveries and actually they can better manage their supply chain. So it's more it's getting more efficient. So that those elements are obviously very beneficial to the Express Industry and DHL Express in particular. But you can also add another flavor to that. Businesses like the example of Mr.
Walker on the last slide can go B2B2C. So Mr. Walker actually has products that you could sell also to an end consumer. So that opens up another new window for these kinds of businesses. So and B2C that's as John talked already about it.
It's our In the meantime, now our bread and butter. So yes, therefore, we can say there's a very good fit with Express. So talking about a good fit from a financial perspective or a Profitability perspective, hopefully, most of you who have been on the tutorials before, You recognize the picture on the left hand side where we focus in on the B2C e Commerce And we explained why B2C e commerce is actually very beneficial to the Express network with the different elements on the network characteristics. And the key driver there was obviously the last mile. But now I think we've proven that by optimizing the last mile by our tools and systems and processes, It is actually leading to a very efficient delivery process with a lot of first time deliveries, which makes the whole business case very good.
If we look at the B2B e commerce side and we would like to compare it with the traditional B2B cycles, As I explained, you have a lot more smaller cross border orders, which generates for the Express more volume. It generates more weight, if you would compare it to B2C And the same is true for revenue per kilo. And if you talk about 1st mile, Hub Sword and Air Lift, More orders, smaller orders will create a better density, better utilization And efficiency in itself. And the last mile, if you compare it to B2C, it's obviously Better because when we make deliveries to businesses, people are always present and can always receive the package when they are there. But if you compare it to the traditional B2B, it's basically the same.
You could even say that smaller orders versus bigger orders gives you the last mile a little bit more efficiency even there. So from the financial profitability perspective, an excellent outlook in terms of B2B e commerce. So what is actually the market saying about the development of B2B e commerce? There are some impressive numbers there stated by well known research companies. And the common denominator is basically very simple.
So the market is growing, is growing very rapidly. You can See here from 2019 in value €12,300,000,000,000 to 2027, almost SEK21 1,000,000,000,000. So good growth numbers. The market is very relevant. As you can see, 12% of the current B2B is already related to e commerce.
And thirdly, It's actually already bigger than the B2C e commerce market. So very interesting numbers. The numbers that we saw also a couple of years back when we started to talk about B2C e commerce, We saw the growth. We invested in it. And actually what we now see is exactly the same.
So good growth And we definitely see the opportunity there. And we definitely see the development taking off with our customers, Lots of initiatives, developments of websites and what have you. So, yes, a clear indication there. So we have seen what we mean by B2B e Commerce. It has a good fit with Express.
There is growth potential. But what is actually driving this trend? What is driving this? And that is the B2B buyers' behavior. And Gartner, a research company that you all know pretty well, I imagine, they Fact that if you look at the year 2025 already 33%, a third of all the buyers desire The seller free sales experience.
And if you look at the millennials of this group, they 44% They do not prefer a sales rep interaction at all. So these are important facts and important statistics to look at. 80% of all these sales interactions will occur in digital channels. So if You as a business, as a B2B player are not thinking about e commerce, then these statistics Would say would clearly point you in the right direction to start working on it and to start investing on it. And luckily, we see that 64% of the B2B companies are already working on it, are investing.
But it is the time really to act. And talking about The customer experience. Some businesses might think, oh, I have already a website and People can actually download the PDF with the product catalog or you can fill in your contact details and then a sales rep might I'll take you within a couple of days. So that's actually my B2B e commerce proposition. I think buyers they expect more than that.
Buyers they are doing their research And they know what they want. And actually, they want to have the capability to place their order and to place their order and without any interference of a sales rep. And they basically want the same experience as they have with B2B Excuse me, with B2C customers and changing the B2B customer. So What do B2B buyers, what do they actually want? So first of all, as mentioned, they want to place that order.
They want to track the order. They want to see the delivery options. They want to track and trace the shipments. They want to have A closer look on the details of the products where in B2C in the B2C arena This is still quite a bit superficial. Okay, you buy new shirts.
If it's cotton or if it's any other fabric, it's good enough. If you are a B2B buyer, you want to have more details. You want to have all the specificities and you want to have all the details. So B2B buyers, they really want to act quickly and they want to buy stuff on the go. And this is obviously a big difference from the traditional channels.
And then going to the millennials, This is a very important group within the B2B customers. But I'm not a millennial. I'm a product of Generation X. So I think it's better that the millennials talk about the millennials. So with that, Wendel, I'm handing over to you.
Yes. Thanks a lot, Michiel. Yes, I am a millennial, actually an early generation millennial, which I think is the best generation ever. So yes, we played in the mud without mobile And we climbed in trees, but at the same time, we were also young enough when the Internet took off or when we were going to our universities, Etcetera, to be familiar completely familiar with technology. And the millennials as a group, it is one of the Accelerator in this whole B2B e commerce trend because millennials are no longer anymore the guys with skateboards who are hanging outside.
No, these are now this is the Group of people who are taking the purchasing decisions, which you can see here right now, millennials are already accounting for 73% or are accounting or involved 73% of all the B2B purchasing decisions. And again, this is the generation which grew up with the Internet, Which had their mobile phones early, which are digitally native, and they expect digital experiences from the B2B companies they are buying from. And also there, the experience they have with B2C and the regularity with which they are shopping online, That is also impacting their buyers' expectation when it comes to B2B. And we saw the percentage already how millennials For 44% of millennials, how do you prefer a no sales rep interaction? No, they want to interact digitally.
They want to Be online, they want to chat online, they want to find information on the websites, etcetera.
Change the slides.
Yes. Another accelerator, of course, a word which has been used, I think, Quite a lot already, the pandemic. Yes, everything was already moving online, and the pandemic really accelerated that. That's something Spoke about as well in our October session. But impact has been significantly big on the way how B2B companies are doing their sales Because if you look at how B2B companies were doing their sales, it was all that traditional selling model.
It was sales reps Flying overseas, meeting customers, sitting down, doing face to face meetings or it was B2B companies going to trade fairs and events, Trying to hook up with a few new customers and a few new clients trying to expand their customer base. But all that completely came to a halt Due to the pandemic, lockdowns were happening, events were being canceled. So B2B companies had to look for other ways to generate their sales. And with that, Many companies were looking or are looking to their e commerce channel, to their online way or doing sales in order to keep growing their business. But Those companies, and that is something what we hear from our existing customer base as well, is they're really looking around to find the right information.
And that is one of the main reasons why we also pulled together this B2B white paper or the ultimate guide to B2B e commerce to really consult our customers in this field and to really take them by the hand and tell them, okay, guys, this is what you need to think about and this is what you need to do. And this is a Trends which is not here to stay because 20% of B2B buyers, they actually say that or only 20% of B2B buyers, they say that they want the traditional in person sales to be returned. In other words, 80% don't. And again, that's the needs of the B2B companies in order to speak to those needs of their customers. And B2B e Commerce is not just for the small orders because you may think like, oh, okay, so B2B e Commerce is If I want to order 1 spare part or if you want to order 1 demo product from a company, if I become a first time buyer of them, No.
B2B decision makers are confirming that they are willing to spend big money online in online transactions. I could see here that 70% of B2B decision makers, they're willing to spend in excess of USD 50,000 in one single order, where 27% within this research, which is explained in the white paper as well, confirmed that they are willing that they were able or willing to Spent more than €500,000 in an online order where the complete transaction is happening online. So again, B2B e commerce, not just for the smaller orders, but also for the big transactions in B2B e commerce. How we will How we will and how we are consulting our customers, which is also part of the white paper, is talking about The flywheel concept. Most of you will know the flywheel concept coming from the book of Jim Collins, From Good TO Great.
We apply the same Flywheel concept internally as well. We launched sales programs, etcetera. But with the white paper, we're also consulting our customers how to get Their e commerce flywheel spinning, their B2B e commerce flywheel spinning and how to make sure that, that flywheel will increase in speed. I will briefly talk through this concept. So it starts on the top right quadrant where it is all about building the e commerce platform or If a company has it already, making sure that it's further optimized.
And again, B2B e commerce is not about having a website, Because just having a website is not B2B e commerce. That is what most companies have or all the companies have, you can say. But what you will find on there is Mission and vision statement, company history, further details about the product, but you cannot transact online. And that is what companies should Start to be doing. And once that is there, then also start to migrate customers from their offline sales channels to that online sales channels.
And of course, make sure the platform is user friendly, etcetera. We will come back on that specific part later. Once the program is there, it's about Rolling out programs to increase loyalty, to have higher order values and to increase the purchasing frequency. So here also, B2B companies should learn from the B2C playbook. And again, we've learned our lesson there, and we have we are consulting our customers in that area already.
I really think about, okay, what can they do when it comes to promotional loyalty programs? And this is also where for the B2B companies, the data collection can start. And we all know that Data has surpassed the value of oil, and that's the big benefit for these B2B companies as well that they can do a lot of data collection. They can check their consumer behavior online. They can check the consumer needs online.
They can check very quickly based on the data, okay, Who bought product B, A, they're also buying product B. So for the next customer who's buying product A, let's make sure I also promote product B. So there are also a lot cross selling opportunities for our B2B customers as well. Once that is happening, our advice is to make e commerce a vital part of your business And even think about shuffling organizational structures because when you want to Be successful in B2B eCommerce, then your organizational structure needs to reflect the same because there will be more demand for the digital marketing teams, for the eCommerce teams, etcetera. And then the last step is to make sure that B2B e commerce is connecting with all the other sales channels because we're not saying that it's 100% B2B e commerce, which has the future.
There will always the need will stay there when it comes to in person sales, when it comes to more complex orders, When it comes to bigger order, when it comes to more demanding customers, but that's also the whole idea of this flywheel is that Once the e commerce channel is there, then B2B companies should think about, okay, when it comes to all the transactional orders, let's make sure that those are all dealt with online in the e commerce channel. And with that, free up space for their own sales teams to deal with the more complex cases, the more demanding cases, etcetera. And with that, the B2B company can free up time of their own salespeople and to move from order intaking to Really doing the consult to sell in what we are doing at Teachers Express as well. And this is all part of the white paper and part how we consult it. So the reason why it is a flywheel is once that is there, then you have more insights, more data, more visibility.
Then the B2B companies can further optimize our e commerce platform, collect more data, make it a better part of your business model, etcetera. And that is how the flywheel starts to Increase in speed. You have seen the or the B2C health check, which was a crucial part of our sales approach and which has proven to be successful in B2C ecommerce, we will do the same in B2B ecommerce because with the launch of the white paper and with the launch of program, Power of Your Potential 3, how we called it. We will also be launching the B2B e Commerce Health Check. For those who were in the October session, we talked through this methodology in detail.
And yes, there are specific similarities when it comes To B2C ecommerce versus B2B ecommerce. And those you can see here an example on the left hand side. These were three elements which were part of Our B2C e commerce health check and which were as which are as important when it comes to B2B e commerce. Things like, okay, do you have that easy accessible B2B Web Store. Do you clearly state on your homepage that you sell internationally, that you take international orders, etcetera?
Do you have a website available in local languages? Do you look use local currency, etcetera? That is as relevant in B2C as it is in B2B. But there are also some crucial differences. Take an example as a detailed product description and think about it.
If you are buying A t shirt as a private individual, yes, you would like to see the color, you would like to see the size. You know the brand already because that's the website you're And you may want to see what kind of fabric it's made from, if it's made of 100% cotton or 80% lycra or Whatever fabric it is. But in B2B, people want to see better detailed product descriptions because when B2B buyers are buying something, They want to understand, okay, does this product fit within my business process? Does this product fit with something I am already using? That is one of the crucial differences.
With that, when it comes to having a powerful search engine because when B2B websites, some might type in the product number, some type in the exact description, some type in Only a vague description. So B2B companies need to make sure that this search functionality on the website is powerful and working Well, last difference when it comes to the difference between B2C e Commerce and B2B e Commerce are an example of those payment options. In B2C e commerce, we're always speaking about having localized payment options. So consulting our customers that when they're selling to the Netherlands that they offer ideal as a payment option, which is 91% of the consumers in the Netherlands, they prefer to pay with that payment option. When they sell to China, we consult them Make sure they have Alipay.
When they sell to Kenya, we make sure that they offer Mpasa as a payment option. But in B2B, there are more payment options Which are needed because, yes, credit card payment is 1, but not every B2B purchaser will have a company credit card or not every B2B purchaser We'll feel convenient to use our own personal credit card for that. So that is where it comes to an example thinking about offering extended payment options, offering. So payment offered effects. So once the goods are delivered, we will send you an invoice.
Think about bank transfers. And these were all elements, which, again, Part of the white paper and part of our consultative approach in B2B e commerce. It's not all plain sailing. We're the last one who are saying that B2B e commerce is easy. And that is also something we are consulting our customers with to be clear to them about the barriers and Challenges they may come across when they start to invest more in their B2B e commerce channel.
Few things which are also highlighted in our Search, which is based on multiple interviews, both internally as well as externally, is number 1, having that digital 1st mindset. Companies need to make sure that it's digital first, and I repeat, digital first, not digital only, and make sure that they also have the right People on board who can roll out programs like this on their side, so can work on optimizing B2B e commerce platforms, etcetera. Secondly, which is related to B2C e commerce, but also related to the point which we feel already mentioned is Yes, everything which has to do with customs and cross border shipping because with B2B e commerce, situation will happen that there will be less Bulk shipments moving from one continent to another and where the distributor, a local distributor takes care of transportation and there can be an increased need of direct Cross border shipping. And that is something, again, that is our bread and butter, and that is where we can consult our customers to be successful and to tackle those challenges heads up. 3rd one is agility.
Some larger companies, they may struggle or they may find it challenging to compete with these Actual startup like companies like Mr. Worker, which we saw in the beginning. And that is also something we explained in the white paper, how to deal those situations and that there is the risk of being left behind if those companies do not act quickly. Last one is pricing. Now rest assured, we're not talking here about Our pricing of Digital Express, but we're talking here about the pricing, which B2B companies apply online.
Because in B2B sales, there's a lot of negotiating of discounts or when it comes to bulk or repeated purchasers, the sales rep gets involved, try to make a good deal. But this is something which needs to be handled online in the B2B e commerce channels as well. And also here, we have multiple ways to consult our customers and have them think about, Okay. Having an easy implementable buy more, pay less option, having bulk discounts online, etcetera. And that is something if you look closely to the homepage of Mr.
Worker and the little walk through video in the beginning, they're clearly positioning that on their homepage saying, guys, If you buy more, your discount will be more. And these are always how we can consult our customers. So To show one more good example, so we saw Mr. Roker in the beginning as a lead type agile company. But here you can also see an example of a bigger company, Auris Components, based in the U.
K, in the technology industry, in the spare parts And we can start the video where you can see it's actually the mobile experience. So this is somebody buying Spare parts on the mobile and buying 2 professional 3 d printers within 25 seconds on their mobile phone. And again, you've seen how that is what the customers want today. That is what the B2B customers want today. If we then link this to Our website health check, our B2B website health check, also interesting to see is that even for this very innovative customers, Yes, they tick these boxes off the website HealthCheck.
But even customers like this, we can further consult them because if you go through the customer journey there, They're not yet offering these multiple payment options. So even for the more advanced companies, we still have something to bring to the table, sit down with That's something also which is proven in all the customer meetings we are having right now. So of course, most important question, okay, why are We're doing this. And Michiel already touched upon it a little bit, but this is all about applying let's say, applying the same trick we did in B2B e And yes, we saw there is not the one and only single source of truth when it comes to the market growth forecast, But we all could see the statistics and which is also confirmed by our first B2B e commerce customers, and it is yes, the B2B e commerce markets should and will Show very attractive sustainable growth, which completely fits our network. And also, again, think about how we started with B2B e commerce a couple of years ago, that Back then, we also may have had some sporadic data, etcetera, but we believed in it.
We tackled it heads on. We launched Power of Your Potential, and we approach it in a very systematic way globally. And with that, we also develop this massive growth market for Digital Express. And with This program with B2B e Commerce, we will do exactly the same on this topic. So it's about applying the same success formula.
John already mentioned it's a vertical within the vertical, but it's a vertical which is definitely emerging and it's already bigger today than B2C e commerce. We will address it in a similar structured or systematic approach how we did it as B2C e commerce and launched That same program globally, etcetera. And with that, we keep our customers' flywheel spinning. And with that, we keep our Express flywheel spinning. That's the whole concept about this approach when it comes to B2B ecommerce.
All this is wrapped up in the white paper as well, which is available for you right now, which is showing and so in summary, it's showing that how the pace of the B2B e commerce sector transformation is something which Not be underestimated, and that is why we also, as a company, have a lot to bring to the table to take our customers by the hand, both existing customers and new customers, and guide them through this journey. There are those digital native buyers combined with the ongoing effect of the pandemic, which is really pushing this change through the industry. And B2B buyers, they want to have this flexible options, convenient customer experience, flexible delivery options, all those elements. And even those B2B players who are already established, think about the RS Components example, they can still further optimize their cross border E commerce channels, and that is something where we can support. But one thing we know for sure is that the payoff in growth opportunities for our customers is unlimited.
And with that, also the payoff in growth opportunities for us is unlimited. So with that, Martin, I would like to hand back over to you.
Excellent. Thank you guys for that very concise run through the deck and for laying out how we are tackling the B2B e Commerce opportunity. So we got time for Q and A. We have a couple of questions that came in already. Nevertheless, Please feel encouraged to type in your questions on the web stream and it will end up here on my screen.
First of all, and that's a question coming from Johannes Braun from Commerzbank. I think you alluded to it a bit, but why has it taken longer for e commerce to find its way into B2B trade relationships compared to B2C. What would be your take on that? And maybe Mikael?
You want to take that, Mikael?
Yes, sure. So why has it taken a bit longer? I think if you look at the B2C, The B2C players, they started from a technology point of view. They had a product And through technology, they pushed the B2C chapter. When you look at B2B E commerce, it comes from a traditional base.
And when you have an established sales channels With importers, with distributors, with agents, it is pretty difficult and maybe sometimes a bit sensitive to actually change that. So I think gradually B2B companies We'll experiment. We'll develop the channel, the e commerce channel. And then they can most likely see that actually when you do it well and when you do it actually in coordination with your sales channel partners, You can find a solution which is better than just having the traditional channel. So yes, hope that answers your question.
And sometimes I think in life you need lots of different projects are competing for IT investment dollars and sometimes you need a little bit of a push or a catalyst to get any one particular thing moving in a direction very quickly. And I think many organizations were onto this when we produced the first B2B paper in February 2018, but I think others, as Mikael rightly says, it's a bit like supply chains. It takes a while. Everyone thinks the Supply chains will change because of the pandemic. And it takes a while to unravel these things.
And these things have served companies very well over the last 2 decades. And when you have an established dealer network and other means of distributing your product, it is not the work of moments To quickly move online for some organizations. Many did move very quickly. But I think now the question, As I often say, has answered itself and everyone is the traditional that's why I think the title to the guide is quite important. The tradition is I'm a traditionalist myself.
The traditionalist has served us well and people continue to serve many avenues of selling. But The need now to shift to the digital selling platform on to a simpler description is Very obvious and very apparent.
Okay. So that's leading to the very expectable question asked by Johannes and Stifel or Mark at Barclays. So if B2C last year was around 45% of the volume, Where do we stand as per now on the B2B count? What was the percentage like? You got an idea?
Well, Linda, I can sort of put some meat on the bone. But I think we're saying at this stage of the game, it's Firstly, it's much more difficult to discern between B2B online and what is traditional B2B. But it's my view is it's mid single digit, single digit and growing extremely quickly. But Linde has had a good look at it by industry, Not so much statistically by industry, but which industries were first into it. And maybe just share some comments on The question itself, Linda, but also the industries that are progressing the quickest.
Yes. It's okay. It's a deep mid single digit what we're seeing right now. And Again, what the market is saying in that estimation was that it was around, say, 10%, 12% of all B2B transactions, which are now Related to this, we did look into the data. What's interesting to see is if you look at the sectors, it was technology and automotive, which was the highest, which is different than B2C e commerce, where we shared showed last year as well that it was specifically fashion, which was having the strongest element.
Also, if we compare the growth of those B2B e commerce accounts versus the, let's say, non B2B e commerce accounts, We also could see that the growth of those customers is significantly higher than those not in B2B e commerce, and that Both based on what we're seeing out of that data as well as what we're hearing from our customers because we're meeting with a lot of customers. And again, they have they Some may have already a B2B e commerce channel in conjunction or together with their traditional sales model. But also there, the feedback of The customer is that, yes, our B2B e commerce channel is growing hard, and it's also something that we're seeing in our data. So again, the interesting is the different verticals or different Sectors for seeing versus B2B Ecommerce and the fact that it is growing harder than the traditional B2B.
Yes. And I think another way of saying it thanks, Linda. Another way Saying is when I first presented to some of those who are on the call now, B2C was around it It's on the slide, but I'm going back even earlier than that, some 26%, 28% of our volume, and it's now touching 50. I think we know that whilst it's a little bit more difficult to measure from a customer point of view, from an industrial point They say it doesn't matter how I sell, it matters that I sell. I move my revenue lines.
We know that this will go in the Same direction really is that shift in traditional B2C e commerce, which has moved from sort of 25 to 50 over the period of about 4 years.
Okay. Maybe shifting on to the current B2B practice, a question coming from Alexia Barclays, maybe to you, Leonard. That Mr. Wirtke side that you just showed as an example, Is that something that was developed with the help of you guys?
Yes. So we're very close to them. We're close to the CEO of that company. So yes, so that was developed together with us. It was not from the so They started it.
But after that, we had multiple sessions with them to share our insight, to share what's our the advice which we can do to share our website HealthCheck. And their also reaction Yes, this is very good, and they did indeed put multiple things in place. Mr. Worker is one example. We have multiple of those examples.
So we always see that Whatever the companies are doing, there's always something we can bring to the table, whether it is when it comes to currency conversion, whether it's when it comes to payment options, whether it's when it comes How they position shipping and delivery on the website. And the feedback from the customers is also always a yes, this is very valuable and yes, We are working on it or yes, actually, we should start working on it.
And a good example of a good example that is just worth commenting, it's a little bit It's a separate billing point. When Brexit happened and January 1 came about, it was Certainly, a number of merchants in the UK or in Europe, and I had a shopping my wife did a shopping experience herself where The company in Spain was no longer servicing the UK. So to Linda's point, there's something we can offer. It is about encouraging these merchants in Europe or in the UK That have suspended sales temporarily and saying we'll help you set up your back calculator or do this or that. And It's about this is why I call it the consultancy.
It's the E in consultancy. It's helping these companies get back online with very simple remedies to their existing website offering that allows them to tell their customers what the VAT will be or whatever it was, it was a post January 1 change. And it's the same in this world. It's not necessarily Brexit related, what we've been talking about today Or it isn't, in fact, Brexit related, but it's about helping the merchants. We know that we help the consumer receive the quality that they want, But the other end of the spectrum about helping the merchant become successful and spanning both ends of that bridge is extremely important to our overall commercial plan.
Maybe also good to mention that one of our biggest eye opening experiences when we launched the B2C e commerce was that we thought like, okay, so these merchants they know everything. They know absolutely everything. And we were just so surprised to see that with Such simple tools like website health check or web analysis tool that customers they were really so pleased To get this moment they didn't know and we could really help them to grow their business. And we feel that Especially for B2B e commerce, this will be exactly the same. So we can really have a clear contribution to that growth.
We're hearing a lot about European examples so far. Is there a regional Sprint is Europe more advanced than say the U. S. Or Asia? What's your view there in a few lines?
Now I mean we have done also a lot of research on the B2B marketplaces. And from that research, you could see that it seemed that Asia and the U. S. Were a little bit more advanced than Europe. But basically, we see the B2B E commerce examples all over the place, all over the globe.
But my guess would be that Asia and the U. S. Are a little bit more advanced than Europe.
Marketplace environment certainly, yes.
Yes. Okay. So now narrowing in on the real big question in there. First on the economics of this, is Any difference in the way you're pricing your shipments compared to B2C? Or is it the same yield logic being applied.
Interesting to watch that one over time over the next couple of years or so. But fundamentally, our pricing to the customer remains the same. If If volumes change dramatically, then so may our pricing approach to that specific customer. But our pricing structure And our pricing construct is very stable and very consistent over the years, and we don't see that changing. I think what is interesting in relation to the in one aspect of the green and yellow and sort of red arrows We had on one of Mikael's slides is that typically these shipments will be a little bit heavier, but they'll which is good for our network, 2 kilos, 4 kilos, 8 kilos, 12 kilos, so to speak, but they'll continue to move very nicely around our automated systems and be packaged extremely well.
So I think B2B has some as that arrow chart It's why in B2B has actually some advantages B2B online over indeed B2C.
Okay. Thank you, John. And now ultimately to the question, how big is this going to be for Express or for DHL Group in a whole. So it's obviously replacing more traditional ways of trade. So this is a real extra not cannibalizing into any of your existing volumes?
Yes. Mikael can touch on that. It's an interesting question.
Yes. So yes, indeed a very interesting question. Obviously, there would be a little bit of cannibalization because whether you have a traditional channel or an e commerce channel, ultimately it needs to go to the customer. But I think for Express, it offers More opportunities as I tried to explain you have a lot more in our view cross border shipments of smaller orders, more volume. So that in itself is obviously great for Express very clearly.
Okay.
And so many people are asking, so Okay, we are somewhere in the mid single digit percentage so far. Do you expect this to grow? Any sort of a target share of volume going forward for the new vertical?
The minute we're just responding We're so busy responding to sort of customer demand in the sense of supporting them, Not with their own website development, but with their own sort of helping hints that, yes, I think we're keeping our sort of powder dry on that. We know that this is An enduring trend. I think we had the e commerce question answered during the course of last year, but that is here to stay. That is how many people now sell on Instagram and Shopify. And the whole there's been a sort of seismic shift and inflection point in how things are doing.
And inevitably, a trade fair and an overseas sales representative to China was never going to keep up With the ability to sell online to the world overnight from your garage. It's as simple as that. It's fanciful to imagine that, that could ever keep up with all the customer demand if someone has a good product. So we know that the growth we know that this will be enduring. We know that it's the next Horizon on the chart, so to speak, but our focus is on spending time with the customers rather than opting out the growth.
And then we continue to need to grow and plan with our investment our investments in Aviation and Ops and Gateways Specifically.
Okay. So if I understand correctly, it's going to grow into the current network volume that will remain very disciplined and focused when it comes to future investments on this, right? Interesting question coming from a couple of people. So with this whole consultancy approach, Do you also take this one step further in helping your customers in getting omni channel ready, I. E, Are we going to see the colleagues from supply chain going to be involved in helping the customers really getting ready for
Yes, sure. I think the group, there is not one e commerce strategy in DPDHL. I think we're all happy to agree with each other. There are 4 E commerce strategies in the divisions that build up to the overall approach of BPDHL to the e commerce opportunity. But already, supply chain is a good example with their European fulfillment network, EFN, where we're partnering on customers And assisting supply chain actually in the setup of that fulfillment network, which seeks to deliver last mile And emergency shipments and fulfillment from a site in Madrid to Spain, for And if anyone wants to know more about that, Mikhail is quite involved in that.
But yes, I think this is a Collaboration is for some time has no longer been no longer a dirty word. And the The collaborative opportunities on e commerce, quite frankly, are as many as the collaborative opportunities on capacity management last year During the pandemic with our aviation assets and as you can imagine, Ken Allen establishing the E Commerce Solutions division coming from Express, You would foresee and predict and expect there's a lot of opportunity there across business unit collaboration And synergies and efficiency.
Okay. So, I thank everyone out Therefore, for the multitude of questions, which I tried to group thematically, I don't think that we missed out on any specific question here. John, Mickey, Landed, thank you very much for introducing our community to the world of e commerce in B2B, definitely from appetizer. So we are going to look forward to you continuing growing this And we will make sure from an IR point of view, of course, that you're out there going to be able to track the progress that press and eventually the other divisions are making out of this real big global trend of B2B trade flows going e commerce as well. With that
Thank you everyone. Thank you for your interest.
Thanks everybody.
Thank you
very much. Thank
you very much. Looking forward to talking to each of you in over the next weeks months. And with that, have a good rest of the day. Thank you, everybody.