The transformation of the global Relay network accelerates. Since its acquisition by the Polish group Imposst, the French company specializing in home delivery reorganizes its distribution chain deeply. Behind a strategy of logistics and automation optimization, it is a whole model of local service which is gradually erased, in particular in rural areas. An evolution that fuels an increasing political challenge, while fragile territories are struggling to preserve their rare economic and social relays.
TL; Dr – Mondial Relay Automatized, the territories win
👥 For whom is it important?
- Mondial Relay partner merchants, particularly in rural areas
- Local communities and elected officials in charge of territorial planning
- Actors of logistics, e-commerce and retail
- Public decision -makers sensitive to the territorial fracture
💡 Why is it strategic?
- Introduce Restructure The Mondial Relay network to prioritize automated lockers
- Up to 3,500 relay points removed, 7,000 lockers planned by 2025
- Automation motivated by logistics and environmental gains
- Risk of exclusion of rural areas without announced compensation device
🔧 What it changes concretely
- Loss of income and traffic for thousands of small traders
- Reduction of access to parcel withdrawal services in small territories
- Emergence of new urban formats like “Mondial Relay City”
- Growing political mobilization in the face of an unconvolved logistical withdrawal
Pack, an industrial operator in search of standardization
Insposed, European leader in the automatic instructions market, has made France a priority axis of its expansion strategy since the acquisition of Mondial Relay in 2021. In continuation of the model developed in Poland, the group imposes a net turn to Automated lockers: Open 24 -hour withdrawal lockers, deployed in urban or peri -urban areas. Between 2021 and 2025, their number should go from 300 to 7,000 units .
Mondial Relay claims a position as a French leader in this segment, and highlights the logistics gains associated with this development. According to an ECOCO2 study relayed by the company, delivery via lockers would reduce up to 79 % greenhouse gas emissions Compared to home delivery, due to the massification of flows over the last kilometer.
A silent break with the local commercial fabric
This strategic repositioning is reflected in the Closure from 2,500 to 3,500 relay points traditional by the end of 2025. About 1,000 new points would be created in parallel, without precision on their nature or their geographical distribution. Even today, 11,000 tradersParticipate in the network, welcoming parcel flows in tobacco, grocery stores or pressings. For these partners, this activity represents a Additional income from 300 to 1,000 euros per monthbut also a way to attract traffic to stores.
In fact, reorganization is done in a unilateral way. Many traders receive letters of breach of contract, without notice. According to socialist deputy Mélanie Thomin, who challenged the government on this subject, this decision taken “without consultation” contributes to destabilizing territories where local services are already reduced to the essentials.
The parliamentarian also recalls thatAbout 62 % of French municipalities are now without shops. In this context, the relay points are not just a logistics link. They constitute a Social ties maintenance levera benchmark in sometimes forgotten territories of major service operators.
Towards an integrated logistics model, without human mediation
Mondial Relay continues, in parallel, a logic of technological innovation. The company offers theRemote opening of lockers via mobile application without physical contact, and develops the concept “Mondial Relay City”,Hybrid urban areas, accessible 7 days a week, combining lockers, customer information and express withdrawal. The first site opened in Paris in the 15ᵉ arrondissement.
This logistics model, aligned with that of Intost, is similar to a Vertical integration of the last kilometerthought for dense urban centers. It optimizes flows, reduces labor costs and responds to growing demand for flexibility. But it raises, in the same movement, the question ofEquity for access to essential servicesbetween hyper-connected metropolises and rural areas left away.
