Fastway Couriers expect improvements in GDP Growth

Media Release - September 2009 www.fastway.co.nz

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Fastway Couriers results supports that New Zealand has seen the tail end of the recession

Fastway Couriers, New Zealand largest privately owned courier company expects to see significant improvements in the July to September GDP growth from the 0.1% growth released by Statistics New Zealand yesterday.

Chief Executive Officer, Bruce Speers says that his network of franchise operators have experienced significant increases in parcel volume in the past six months and was not surprised by the GDP growth (albeit slight) in the April to June period. Further he predicted that the July to September quarter will show significant improvements on the GDP result released yesterday.

With a customer base of over 30,000 SME’s Fastway believes it is an excellent barometer of the New Zealand economy.

Fastway is seen as a dominant player in the small-medium size business express parcel market, and given that this makes up 95% of all business in New Zealand their results are a good indication on the health of the New Zealand economy.

Bruce said that although Fastway had seen positive growth during the recession this had mainly been from customer acquisition from competitors. However since May they had also seen a significant increase in freight volumes from their existing customers and expect to achieve parcel volume growth of 7% for the July to September quarter. This is a 400% improvement on the previous quarter and is directly related to improvements in the economy and business confidence.

If other businesses have seen similar results to that of Fastway Couriers, they should be well placed to see out the tail end of the recession and then act as catalysts in boosting the health of the New Zealand economy again.

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