July 8 (SeeNews) - Bulgarian postal operator Tip Top Courier raised its turnover by 50% to 7.0 million levs ($5.0 million/3.5 million euro) in 2008 and expects to boost it this year by winning new clients, a senior company official said.
“I hope we succeed in raising the turnover because the number of clients is constantly on the rise and a growing number of people are opting for private postal operators due to the better quality of service,” Tip Top Courier board chairman Lachesar Kaparashev told SeeNews in a recent interview.
In 2006 Tip Top Courier was lisensed as the first private universal postal services provider in Bulgaria. It launched the universal postal services under the trademark T-Post in the middle of 2007.
Bulgaria's postal services market is dominated by state-owned Bulgarian Posts, which has a monopoly on delivery of letters of up to 50 grammes. The monopoly should have expired at the end of last year but was extended until the end of 2010.
This extension of Bulgarian Posts' monopoly “changed radically” Tip Top Courier's initial plans under which the company had planned to invest some seven million levs in building its network for universal postal services by 2009, Kaparashev said.
“The extension of the monopoly deprives us from revenues which we would have invested in the network,” he added . “The key problem is that the sector reserved for Bulgarian Posts accounts for over 80% of all parcels.”
Instead, Tip Top Courier spent half of the planned investments on the development of the postal network, purchase of vehicles and the construction of a sorting centre. The other investments will be delayed.
The economic crisis led to a delay of payment from clients, which means more costs for Tip Top Courier, Kaparashev said.
Among the main Tip Top Courier's clients are international companies which are making large-scale budget cuts due to the economic downturn and the banks which too are cutting costs.
Despite the difficulties Tip Top Courier is aiming to raise its market share in universal postal services to 20% by the end of this year from between 7.0% and 9.0% last year, Kaparashev said.
Apart from universal postal services Tip Top Courier provides also courier and hybrid mail services.
The Bulgarian postal services market grew by 24% to 206 million levs in 2007 and was expected to expand by some 20% last year, according to the latest available data from the market regulator. The local market for universal postal services grew by 17% to some 65.1 million levs in 2007.
Apart from Bulgarian Posts, Tip Top Courier competes with two other privately-owned universal postal services operators. Over 70 companies offer courier services in Bulgaria.
1 euro = 1.95583 Bulgarian levs)