(Reuters) – Dutch postal operator PostNL issued a subdued 2025 forecast for its two main divisions on Monday, citing a challenging market and unpredictable client concentration due to changing consumer behaviour.
Its earlier plea for government support was rejected by the Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs on Friday, intensifying the company’s challenges after it already warned on 2024 profit in January.
“The financial performance strongly underlines that the current business model is no longer sustainable,” CEO Herna Verhagen said in a statement.
Traditional postal services in Europe, some of which are facing financial pressures, are struggling to keep up with competition from other parcel locker firms such as Poland’s InPost and Amazon.
PostNL, which delivers parcels and letters across the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg, said it expected a volume decline of 8% to 10% at its Dutch mail segment in 2025, while aiming to achieve cost savings of between 40 million and 45 million euros ($42 million and $47 million).
The postal company sees growth of between 1% and 3% at its parcel segment this year, lower than the assumed growth of 4% to 5% in the Dutch e-commerce market, it said.
For 2024, it reported an operating profit (EBIT) of 53 million euros, confirming the preliminary reading it gave in January.
It proposed a dividend of 0.07 euros per share for the year.
($1 = 0.9513 euros)
(Reporting by Johan Bodinier, Alessandro Parodi and Olivier Cherfan in Gdansk; editing by Milla Nissi)
