Press release
Paris, 08 June 2023
The Belgian government has just launched a European call for tenders to appoint an operator for home delivery of the press over the next five years.
The tender covers all home delivery services for Belgium's 11 million inhabitants, for all daily newspapers in the first lot and for all periodicals in the second lot.
The deadline for submitting bids is 8 June 2023. The decision is expected to be taken before the end of the year, with implementation scheduled for 1 July 2024.
More than 500,000 copies of newspapers need to be distributed every day, and just over 3 million copies of periodicals every week, representing more than 2,850 distribution rounds, seven million working hours, and the equivalent of 3,300 full-time delivery staff and 500 support and management staff.
The Riccobono Group has responded to this invitation to tender via its subsidiary Proximy, which is the focus of one of its four development divisions. This project is fully in line with the values and ambitions of the Riccobono Group, which is aiming to double its turnover in the coming years by building on its international presence.
The current circumstances, which have postponed the deadline for submitting the invitation to tender, allow a new operator to emerge. To meet this challenge, the Riccobono Group will invest over €15 million.
Proximy, France's leading delivery service provider with 180,000 subscribers and 4,400 points of sale every day, exclusively in the Ile-de-France region, thanks to its 1,500 contract employees, has references that give it a good chance of winning all or part of this market.
On the strength of its expertise and the specific IT tools it has developed over the years, in particular for optimising routes and assisting carriers, Proximy believes it has serious assets to be selected, while remaining open to finding an agreement with one or more of its colleagues to provide the best conditions and services for Belgian publishers.
The Belgian government has decided to cut subsidies from €175 million to €125 million a year over 5 years by reducing the quality of service and delivering only 80% of copies before 7.30 a.m. and the rest before 8.30 a.m., rather than 100% before 7.30 a.m. as is currently the case.
As part of its response, Proximy is proposing to improve service quality by delivering 90% of copies before 7.30am.
Aware of the social issues at stake, Proximy's offer will take into account the situation of the 3,300 employees of the current service provider BPost and will propose suitable contracts.
One of the reasons why Proximy has decided to position itself in this market is also the Belgian government's strong support for delivery, which from 2024 will represent almost 55 centimes of aid per copy for dailies and 24 centimes per copy for periodicals.
In France, despite the public authorities' stated intention to increase their support for portage in order to favour it over postal delivery, aid per copy is still only 4 euro cents for portage (plus 4 cents for the network), and 30 cents per copy for postal delivery, i.e. almost 6 times less than in Belgium.
Nonetheless, this gap should narrow, and aid for delivery should at least come close to postal aid, if the French government's stated intention to favour delivery over postal service becomes a reality.
The Riccobono Group hopes that this rebalancing between postal aid and support for portage will be one of the issues addressed by the mission on press distribution launched by the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Culture.
Find Riccobono Group on :
Press contact :
Jean-Clément TEXIER
Coficom: 06 60 68 93 95
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