As part of the national 2024 Year of Warehousing campaign, announced by Minister Richard Holden MP at the House of Lords in October last year, CEO of the UK Warehousing Association (UKWA) Clare Bottle, has visited XPO Logistics in Milton Keynes, as part of a nationwide tour of 80 UK warehouses to showcase this important sector.
2024 The Year of Warehousing campaign marks the 80th anniversary of the UK Warehousing Association, and this visit recognised XPO Logistics‘ investment in upgrading facilities to support its customers and the importance of warehousing to the region’s economy.
On the visit Clare met with Glen Brotherton, Operations Director, and Lynn Brown, Vice President, Human Resources—UK and Ireland, to tour the warehouse to see how the operation stepped up to facilitate a highly efficient spare parts delivery service to ensure commercial vehicles, including emergency services fleets can be kept on the road; and all about the expert team responsible for maintaining the strong business partnership.
Equipping the site with a 7000-location racking build and a 30.000-location mezzanine not only served the customer, it also boosted local employment opportunities, as Lynn Brown explained:
“Our warehouse in Milton Keynes is positively impacting the UK economy. We recently created 104 jobs in this facility, including warehouse operatives, HGV drivers and transport operations, supplier workers, security guards, and cleaners. Our company also supports the local charities Macmillan Cancer Support and Willen Hospice and, nationally, the Over the Wall charity.
She continued:
“We are committed to being a positive contributor to our local community. XPO Logistics has worked with the local authorities to examine colleagues’ travel-to-work schemes to help reduce CO2e, rain harvesting installations to minimise water consumption, beehives to support the surrounding environment, and the “Red-Runners” using our site as a base for some of their local events.”
Clare Bottle said,
“Warehousing remains one of the fastest growing, yet least understood sectors in the UK. This is partly because people rarely see what happens inside these often-vast buildings, where millions of products are processed every day. Accordingly, the essential work warehouses provide has always been ‘behind the scenes’ and therefore to a large extent under-appreciated, yet the warehousing and logistics sector contributes £163bn GVA to the UK economy, is a major employer and force for social mobility.
2024 The Year of Warehousing aims to turn the spotlight onto the million plus people who work in warehousing, dispel outdated perceptions, and celebrate the role of the sector in our national life.”
