Federal Express pushes for growth [Archives:2004/735/Business & Economy]

By Peter Willems
Yemen Times Staff
Federal Express Yemen announced that it is using new strategies to continue to grow and become the largest courier service company in the local market.
“We are now developing and using new and innovative ways to attract more customers and grab a larger part of the market,” said Ismail Al-Baidani, Business Development Manager of Federal Express in Yemen.
Since the beginning of 2004, Federal Express has established new shipping centers where customers can easily drop off packages to have them shipped.
The FedEx Authorized Ship Centers uses a variety of locations, such as hotels, travel agencies and shopping centers, and there are up to 20 new locations in Sana'a and 10 in Aden. The goal of Federal Express is to have 40 drop-off locations by the end of the year.
“This strategy is to let different businesses ship for Federal Express and make life easier for customers,” said Al-Baidani. “In the last few years, we focused heavily on corporate clients. After succeeding in capturing a large number of businesses, we are now focusing more on targeting walk-in, individual customers.”
Recently, Federal Express in Yemen, under the licensee of Federal Express Corporation, Falcon Aviation, Inc., developed new technology to offer more efficiency to its customers. The FedEx Ship Manager program allows customers to prepare shipping packages on the Internet instead of traveling to a Federal Express location and filling out forms manually.
Federal Express also established Customer Experience Management that offers special care and services to customers and Executive Club Program designed for business clients.
“We have tried to differentiate ourselves from our competitors by developing added value to our products and services,” said Al-Baidani.
Federal Express in Yemen, part of the largest courier service company in the world which pulled in over $22 billion in revenue in 2003, has also increased its marketing budget by 200% and doubled its sales force in the last year-and-a-half. In the same period, Federal Express opened new offices in Mukalla, Seyoun and Shabwa: It now has offices in eight major Yemeni cities.
But the courier company has to face stiff competition in Yemen. DHL is the leader in the local market, which established its presence in the early eighties and held around 45% of the market, both inbound and outbound packages, at the end of 2003.
Federal Express didn't enter the market until the mid-nineties. But, according to Federal Express, its new products and services have helped increase its market share, up from 20% in 2002 to 27% last year.
And while implementing new strategies, Federal Express expects to grab more of the market.
“I believe that Federal Express will take over and be the number one courier business in Yemen by the end of this year,” said Al-Baidani.
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