Welcome to the September 1st Warehouse & Logistics News. After Team GB’s glorious triumph at the Olympics, the greatest legacy must be that it’s harder now for us to wallow in our usual despair about how rubbish we are. We’re actually pretty good at elite sport. Now Brits have got to become equally positive about supporting our industry – starting with appreciating the importance of warehousing and logistics.

In this issue we’ve got three scheduled features to help readers in W&L operations grab some of the Olympic spirit and do their bit to help British industry get ready for economic recovery. In ‘Pallet Networks’, we hear from some of the major networks about how they are helping strengthen UK supply chains; ‘Buildings/Facilities’ covers main structures and key equipment including temporary structures; and ‘The Loading Bay’ takes in industrial doors, dock levelers and dock lifts, essential parts of every large warehouse operation.

If the Olympics have got us now thinking positively about the UK’s sporting abilities, it could soon also be time for us to stop indulging in another favourite pastimes – moaning about the state of British industry. This may be the silly season for hard news, but regardless of that the Tree of Positivity has been bearing plenty of fruit recently.

If you’ve missed it because you’ve been on holiday, almost 120,000 cars were built here in July – 22% more than a year ago, and the 13th monthly increase in production. And then there are the recent unexpectedly good retail sales figures, which help build hopes that our recession may not be as severe as first feared. The ONS reported sales volumes in July rose 0.3% on June, and 2.8% on 2011. They also upgraded their estimate of June’s monthly sales increase from 0.1% to 0.8%. And on top of that, the latest figures for numbers out of work in the UK fell 46,000 to 2.56 million in the three months to June.

Finally, looking at the future workforce, it’s ‘A’ level results time. For warehousing and logistics companies thinking of recruiting, the good news is that the number of students taking Maths and Physics ‘A’s continues to rise. Combine that with the long-term trend for more people to aspire to go to university, and it’s good news for employers looking for bright people with relevant higher education qualifications, who want to make a career for themselves in the warehousing and logistics industry. We certainly need them.

Warehouse & Logistics News

Comments are closed.