Now in its 4th year the UK Express Delivery Conference took the plunge this month by transferring the event from the midlands to London's Olympia Conference centre. As a result there were many more users, carriers and suppliers attending than at any previous year's events.

Triangle, the event organisers, worked with key organisations such as the imrg (Internet Media Retail Group – the trade body for e-tailers), MetaPack (organisers of an annual shipper workshop) and Motor Transport (responsible for the MT Awards Gala Dinner on the final evening) to ensure the event covered all the main topical issues and was all inclusive, a fact which undoubtedly contributed to its success and exactly matched the umbrella theme of Working Together for Successful Delivery. As a result there were more of the industry's users meeting with more carriers and discussing more delivery related issues than at any previous event.

A major focus of the conference was the dramatic growth in home shopping with its subsequent impact on the B2C delivery market. The home delivery sector was very well represented at the event, through premium sponsor Home Delivery Network and support sponsor Parcelnet, each of whom gave interesting insights to a distribution partnership approach through joint presentations with one of their major customers. This theme was also picked up through imrg's involvement in their annual shipper workshop being part of the whole event. Other workshop sessions also addressed how a partnership approach could help through driving out costs, developing new services and conquering the Christmas peak.

The retailers and e-retailers were very well represented with over a third of conference delegates including; Computacentre, Comet, Direct Wines, Dell, e-Buyer, Home Retail Group, J.P. Boden, John Lewis, Next, RS Components, and Unipart for example. As well as the current and developing B2C issues, the conference also looked to the future, particularly in terms of the environmental issues facing the industry. This was highlighted by the presentation from TNT's Nigel Barton on its electric vehicle trials in London.

Transport for London (TfL), another support sponsor, ran one complete conference track session to debate some of the main issues affecting our capital city including the forthcoming London Freight Plan (publication expected in the autumn), the role of Freight Quality Partnerships and the new Freight Operators Recognition Scheme (FORS). Other Conference support sponsors included Barclays, Intermec, NetDespatch and Business Direct.

The delegates appreciated the key note presentation from the newly appointed Shadow Secretary of State for Transport, Theresa Villiers, who was a last minute replacement for Chris Grayling due to his transfer to Work and Pensions just 36 hours earlier in a Shadow Cabinet re-shuffle. Other key note speeches enlivening the event included; David Smith, MD at Parcelforce Worldwide, Neil Ashworth, Supply Chain Director at Tesco Direct and Nick Parkes, European Transport Director at Technicolor who demonstrated to delegates that the UK stands up well in comparison to many European countries for the quality of its domestic express delivery service.

The conference ended with the now traditional Q&A session involving a panel of four of the biggest names in the carrier sector. Joining Parcelforce's David Smith were Carole Woodhead, MD at Parcelnet, Walter Blackwood, MD at Home Delivery Network and Steve Allen, CEO at Nightfreight. The panel faced a variety of probing questions from the audience and was chaired by Paul Carvell, former CEO at Business Post, now at Business Direct.

Together with the record number of stands in the exhibition area, the whole event was a combination truly representative of the document, express parcel and pallet delivery interests in this country. The huge opportunities offered by the growth in B2C (with e-retail continuing to grow at significantly higher rates than the more mature B2B sector) had the 300+ delegates at this year's event buzzing both inside the main conference hall and outside in the exhibition and networking areas.

The transfer to London for the 2007 UK Express Delivery Conference clearly exceeded expectations from many points of view, but there is a lot for the operators to consider if they are to meet those expressed needs of the users before next year's event.

Triangle Management Services Ltd, founded in 1984, is today the pre-eminent independent specialist management services company within the global mail, express and logistics sectors. Triangle offers the following services to clients: Recruitment, Market Research, Consultancy, Conferences and Mergers and Acquisitions - all of which focus primarily on the mail and express industry sectors.