The UK logistics recruitment market has already seen significant changes over the last six to nine months as a result of the uncertainties in the global financial markets. 

Andy Howard, director of recruitment solutions provider The Logistics Network, told IFW that companies in the retail sector had largely frozen their recruitment of in-house logistics staff, but there were new opportunities for providing flexible workforce and logistics solutions. 

“Companies are not letting people go, but they are also not taking people on,” he said. 

“They are still keeping their good people, as the need for good sales staff is even more important during more difficult times.” Howard said that for simple recruitment providers, this was a concern, but it presented opportunities for more creative solutions. 

For example, Howard said one retailer had recently asked him to set up warehousing and 80 staff for a 12-month period, as opposed to committing their own assets and resources. 

Other trends included the return of some temporary workers to Poland after three to four years in the UK as a result of rapid wage increases in their home country. 

In some parts of the UK, Polish workers had been occupying the majority of warehousing positions in some facilities. 

Howard gave an example of one warehouse where the entire night-shift was Polish and where the warehouse operating system switched from English to Polish at night. 

But increased use of staff from countries such as Slovakia and Lithuania was one solution to the return of staff to Poland, although the use of multiple nationalities involved more complications compared with single nationality teams. 

Howard said new opportunities for The Logistics Network included offering recruitment solutions in less mature logistics markets in eastern Europe, where his company had developed contacts and experience and where logistics providers were increasingly locating value-added activities. 

Examples included Ukraine, which one garment retail customer was using for finishing products made in China for the western European market.