Did you know picking up your parcel from one of our lockers is the single biggest sustainable difference you can make to your online shopping? At OOHPod we love to bring you fresh ideas and new ways to make your online shopping deliveries easy, greener and as flexible as your busy life demands. 

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OOHPod | Smart Parcel Lockers Ireland | A Blog On All Things Parcel Locker And Last Mile

Published: March 13, 2022. Download the article here.

"For me, in-person communication is the best way to achieve business goals"

John Tuohy, a veteran of the parcel business and founder of delivery service OOHPod, shares his relief at the return of in-person meetings and his admiration for the courage and leadership of the president of Ukraine.

I always had an interest in entrepreneurship, so I spent two years completing a "start your own business" course in the 1980s with Anco, which was the predecessor to Fás, the state training agency that is now called Solas.

I've been running my own businesses since 1992, and prior to that I held a senior management role at FedEx when I was in my early 20s. Back then my goals were simply to be as successful as I could be and to learn and grow from my experience on that journey.

While those goals are still hugely important to me, I quickly learned that with success and growth comes huge responsibility. You have a team working with you and that adds another layer of motivation to make sure the business succeeds, to keep them in employment, make sure they are happy, and help them meet their own individual responsibilities.

My mentors and people that I've admired over the years would be successful business leaders in Ireland and internationally. Lord Karan Bilimoria, the founder and chair of Cobra Beer, is a good example given his success in his business and the work he does for society generally.

Then there are Irish retail heroes like the late Feargal Quinn, the Dunne family and Joe Barrett and Bob Etchingham at Applegreen. They have run successful Irish businesses in what are probably the most fiercely competitive sectors, ones that are usually dominated by huge global brands.

Leading by example is the best way to create the right impression in the workplace. If you want an atmosphere of mutual respect and collegiality, it can be achieved by practising what you preach. Listening and being respectful of other people's views work, while poorly communicating your business objectives doesn't.

If you're keen to progress in an organisation, perhaps from one management role into a more senior one, be sure to prepare your successor. Ensure that you have identified the person on your team who is likely to replace you. Give them the reins and empower them from time to time. Test this when you go on holiday, so that you can be confident your number two has things covered.

Business really shouldn't be about politics and egos, but they tend to get in the way sometimes, especially in larger organisations. Everyone will have experienced situations where their ideas or suggestions are either not listened to or taken by others who then claim credit for them. This creates friction and can affect relationships between co-workers. Communication and due credit is key to ensuring that every contribution is valued and attributed accordingly.

My last job interview was in the 1980s. I remember having to go into Arnott's to open a store credit account so that I could buy a business suit, which I then paid in monthly instalments. At the time, lots of people did this.

Countless times over the years I've interviewed candidates who have not done any kind of research about the company, the sector or even the role they had applied for. My advice to interviewees is to give your best impression, be confident, always prepare in advance and do thorough research.

In a company, everyone should under-stand what is expected of them, but at the same time people need to be informed on how they are performing in a regular, structured way. If someone does a good job, employers should let them know. Performance reviews can sometimes be too focused on weaknesses and failure rather than successes and strengths.

It's important to ensure that poor performers, unreasonable personalities or people who just don't fit in are dealt with quickly. Hopefully their performance improves and attitudes are corrected quickly. If that's not possible or doesn't happen, then they should be removed from the team or business altogether.

Poor performers left unchecked impact on morale and can bring good performers down, or worse, drive good people out of a business. Jack Welch wrote about this in his first book From the Gut.  It's an excellent read that I'd recommend to any business leader.

After two years of working from home, it's so good to be back in a working environment with colleagues. For me, in-person communication is the best way to achieve business goals.

 It's so important to be open and honest in our business dealings and to ensure the highest levels of integrity.

Despite the excellent technology and tools that we have for remote working, it's just not the same. A mixture of both can be very successful. Spontaneity can be powerful in team meetings when it comes to new ideas and innovation, and that can be difficult to achieve over a planned Teams call.

Networking in business is essential. LinkedIn is such an amazing way to network online but events like trade shows and business functions are so important to meet like-minded people and gain new insights and ideas. Meeting people allows you build a better rapport than you would do on a phone call, so I'm really looking forward to getting back out there and shaking hands again.

As the old saying goes, "we only get one chance to make a first impression". It's so important to be open and honest in our business dealings and to ensure the highest levels of integrity.  From that foundation, great and lasting relationships flow.

Right now, I can't think of anyone I admire more than president Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine. He is the epitome of courage and leadership for the people of Ukraine in the most appalling and terrifying circumstances. He could easily have left the country to govern remotely. He chose to stay and lead by example.

John Tuohy, a veteran of the parcel business and founder of delivery service OOHPod, shares his relief at the return of in-person meetings and his admiration for the courage and leadership of the president of Ukraine. 

OOHPod | Smart Parcel Lockers Ireland | This Working Life with John Tuohy, Business Post

John Tuohy, with his new business OOHPod features in Business Post

Published: Sunday February 13 2022, 12.01am GMT, The Sunday Times.

John Tuohy, the former boss of the courier companies Nightline and Parcel Motel, isn’t afraid of a logistical challenge. For his 50th birthday he organised how to get from his Malahide home to the Mad Cool music festival in Madrid on his motorbike, setting off five days before friends who opted to fly instead.

He had bought a BMW R 1200 GS bike in his forties when he was going through “a midlife crisis,” and after passing his test travelled across Europe on it, choosing to stay in cheap hostels along the way.

Cost isn’t an issue for Tuohy, especially since selling Nightline and Parcel Motel to UPS for €30 million in 2017 and taking his 40 per cent cut. Instead, he likes to embrace the “camaraderie on the road” while making sure that his vehicle is always visible from his window.

Tuohy is preparing for his latest challenge — the launch of an Irish parcel locker company called OOHPod. It’s a venture he has been planning for some time. Since selling out of Parcel Motel in 2017 he has acted as a consultant to parcel locker companies throughout Europe. He felt that it was now time to get back on the bike, as it were.

With OOHPod he aims to place “out of home” lockers in 1,000 locations across the island of Ireland by 2025. To achieve it, Tuohy has bolstered his team, bringing in Orla Sheils, who formerly headed Parcel Motel, as chief operating officer. Patrick Crean, formerly of Bank of Ireland and Channel 4 in London, has joined as chief technology officer.

This week 91 lockers will open to the public in Jonesborough, Co Armagh, a new facility strategically placed to cater to online shoppers on both sides of the border.

"Our new facility will appeal to people from Drogheda, Dundalk and Monaghan, targeting 25,000 households. We think it will be convenient for people to pop in there when they are doing cross-border shopping and order online to avoid delays.”

A rented retail unit has been fitted with changing rooms to cater to shoppers that might want to return their items on the spot. Tuohy says that 30 per cent of all items bought online are returned.

He says there is a place on the Irish market for OOHPod and the company won’t be in direct competition with Parcel Motel — which allows only UPS couriers to use its lockers.

“This is open and agnostic infrastructure and UPS, just like any of the other couriers, are welcome to use our parcel lockers.”

His backers believe there is room, too. With the help of Declan Magee and Mike Perrick, who are both formerly of Elkstone Ventures, the Artane native has raised €3 million in seed funding. Grant Thornton also helped.

Tuohy has put €1 million of his own money into the company and secured €1.5 million from investors behind JMC Van Trans, an Irish logistics company, while the remaining €500,000 has come from private investors. He plans to raise a further €3 million from banks to pay for the cost of the lockers themselves.

He has plenty of contacts built up from his 30 years of working in the courier business, which started when he drove with FedEx Ireland after leaving school in 1989. While he worked his way up to management by the age of 20 there, he opted to leave when the company downsized its European business in 1992.

With IR£10,000 (€12,700) pooled between him and his friend Dave Field, who also opted to leave the courier, the duo set up Nightline from the spare room of the new house Tuohy had just bought in Castleknock. While he liked being his own boss 1990s Ireland was a “grim” place and his options were either to emigrate or try to do his own thing. “We would have had to go to London to look for jobs; there wasn’t a whole lot going on here at the time” says John.

Nightline became a niche shipping company for Irish manufacturers. “We were just focused on international shipping, and it was very specialised,” Tuohy says, adding that the company worked to get parts for its clients quickly and make a good name for itself.

When manufacturing started to decline in Ireland Tuohy started to grow the domestic courier business. In the early Noughties it was “simple” to run with many deliveries taking place between businesses, he says.

As the company handled shipments of high-value goods including tobacco and mobile phones, Tuohy installed a panic room in his home and his family underwent security training. “It was very The Man from U.N.C.L.E stuff,” he says. The advice was for him and his family to remain as private as possible and stay away from social media sites — something Tuohy has kept to this day, opting not to name his family members.

By 2008 the ecommerce market was beginning to grow and Tuohy decided the company needed to enter the residential market or get left behind. He says Ireland’s online customers bought mostly from UK retailers so he opened an office there and watched as the business doubled in size by 2012.

It was a “high volume, low margin” business — and one that came under more pressure to lower prices during the recession when clients were doing poorly. It also fluctuated hugely from season to season. Tuohy started to think outside the box. He started to look at parcel lockers as a delivery option that could be more profitable.

In 2010 he saw that parcel lockers were taking off in the Nordic region and eastern European countries. Through trade shows he began to network and forged one valuable contact, Rafał Brzoska, who operates Poland’s InPost, a parcel locker company that floated on the Amsterdam stock exchange for €9.5 billion last year. Brzoska called Tuohy one day to say he had 100 spare machines that he could buy. 

“Back then these machines cost €25,000 to €30,000 a pop, so we needed about €3 million and no Irish bank was going to lend to us that in 2012,” Tuohy says.

After explaining the situation Tuohy got a follow-up phone call a few days later from the Polish chief executive to say a loan could be secured from a Polish bank.

Tuohy says that Parcel Motel, founded in 2012, was profitable as a standalone business. “It got a lot of mentions internationally as a good example of a parcel locker rollout and when we brought it to Ireland, many people thought it was a franchise because the branding was so strong.”

With the sale of Nightline in 2017 Parcel Motel was sold to UPS. Tuohy says that at the time of the sale the company was facing Brexit, and while it had grown substantially and had revenues of more than €50 million a lot of money would have to be spent to ensure the courier could keep afloat.

He said that the company had been built on a lot of debt, having never taken on any outside investment, apart from small sums given by family and friends at the very beginning. “We weren’t getting the right advice on equity investment, and we were thinking in the old-school ways that equity was blood,” he says.

If he had known that three years later the world would be faced with a pandemic, and the ecommerce market would boom, he says he probably would have held on to the business.

“I wouldn’t have sold, but you have to take decisions based on the circumstances that you are in at that time.”

For now, Tuohy’s focus is solely on OOHPod, By the end of this year he plans to install OOHPod’s lockers across 50 locations around Dublin. He has already signed APCOA Parking Ireland and Parkrite as clients, and is at present surveying ten car parks.

Tuohy is also in talks with Dublin Bus to install lockers near bus stops in suburban areas around the city and employers, who would like lockers installed in offices. He is also exploring other avenues, such as refrigerated lockers that will allow him to form partnerships with grocery stores, and placing lockers at service stations throughout the country.

When it comes to timing, Tuohy thinks OOHPod’s is perfect — launching with people returning to the office and hybrid working set to become a reality. Consumers will no longer be sitting at home waiting for their deliveries by the door.

Couriers will be facing a logistical nightmare in the coming months, and Tuohy argues that parcel lockers will become more convenient. Long-term, he has big ambitions for the company and is already plotting to enter the European parcel locker market and consolidate an industry that is fragmented through the acquisition of start-ups.

It sounds like the BMW bike road trips might be put on the back burner for a while.

VITAL STATISTICS
 Age: 54
 Family: Wife, teenage son and daughter at university
 Home: Malahide
 Education: Chanel Catholic College, Coolock; diploma at London School of Economics
 Favourite film: The Founder
 Favourite book: Jupiter’s Travels, by Ted Simon

WORKING DAY
 I start off the day with exercise and do a bit of work from my home office. I drop my son to school and then go to the office after 9 o’clock. I’m usually in the office until 6pm. We have a showroom so my day is spent talking to a lot of clients.

DOWNTIME
When I left Nightline I was very overweight so I lost 20 kilos through cycling. I make sure to cycle or do a 5km walk. I love music and I have tried to learn the guitar. I’ve also done some Spanish classes and can order a dish in Spanish now. I have my touring bike and love travelling on it.

A recent article from The Times with OOHPod CEO, John Tuohy. John Tuohy is launching his new business in Armagh and has plans to expand across the rest of Ireland and into Europe. A look at his past experiences and plans for his new parcel locker business, "OOHPod".

OOHPod | Smart Parcel Lockers Ireland | The Entrepreneur that wants to capitalise on ecommerce growth and cross-border shopping

'The Times' interview with OOHPod CEO, John Tuohy

Capitalising on Ecommerce Growth and Cross Border Shopping

The role of micro businesses in the Irish economy in terms of innovation, employment and growth should not be underestimated. In Ireland micro-businesses with 1-9 employees comprise over 90 per cent of all businesses. Research conducted by Cork University Business School demonstrates that ambition plays an important role in ensuring businesses achieve their full potential. The report suggests that micro-businesses in Ireland compare well internationally with respect to introducing new or improved products and services.

To compete with big online brands like Amazon and eBay, smaller retailers are building their own online shop fronts, looking for alternatives in product delivery and pickup solutions all while trying to cut costs.  It’s a big ask. How, then, can your small business compete with these online giants? The good news is you don't have to. 

Agile structures and quick decision making are key advantages for many micro and small businesses. In fact, levels of innovation in Irish micro-businesses are higher than those in the UK and USA. This is particularly valuable when it’s time to get innovative to satisfy your customer needs. Chances are most of your customers are located within 10 kilometres of your small business. This means getting creative with click and collect solutions, while saving on delivery costs, has never made more sense.

Currently, many businesses are still relying on the major parcel couriers to make their deliveries, even though this is costly and does not give them as much control over that important final customer experience as they may like. However, the future for alternative solutions for click and collect looks bright. More and more local businesses just like you, are looking to intelligent, contactless parcel lockers to combat the costly last-mile – all while making it faster, safer and more accessible to the consumer.

For the customer, driving to you may not be quite as convenient as home delivery, but studies have shown that offering customers choice can improve the overall customer experience. As well as putting a focus on building a top-notch e-commerce journey or creating a seamless social media transaction, providing a smooth click and collect experience with a clearly designated pickup location will demonstrate that your business is organised and efficient.

A digital locker system can have considerable benefits for your small businesses because it is a smart, contactless, secure and efficient way to offer collection services for your customers. It is convenient for your consumer who can pick up the goods in their own time and it helps your business to organise and store online orders. The best news is that this solution works for any size of business, whether you have an e-commerce website or not. It works particularly well for businesses working from their own home who would prefer to have customers pick up orders from a neutral location.

With smart parcel lockers, retailers have a unique opportunity to turn the current home delivery model on its head: promote free locker pickup and make it easy for customers to pick up their goods at a time that suits them. This significantly decreases shipping expenses and could possibly reduce packaging costs too - savings that could be reflected in prices.

A recent article from OOHPod states “retailers will increasingly rely on innovation to make shopping more of an experience whether that’s in person or online, while consumers will make their grocery retail choice based on convenience and other beneficial experiences brought about by innovation in this space.” In simple terms, many retailers are craving new ideas to help them stand out from the crowd. A locker subscription with OOHPod could be the answer they’ve been looking for.

If you’d like to find out more about using OOHPod lockers for your business contact us on any of our social platforms or through hello@oohpod.com about becoming an OOH Business. OOHPod, your out of home delivery station, coming soon.

You don't need to be a big business to offer click & collect. Find out how parcel lockers are changing the game for small businesses.

OOHPod | Click & Collect Solution for Small Businesses

Click & Collect Solution for Small Businesses

It’s undeniable that how we buy food has evolved since the pandemic pushed us to be more creative in our daily routines. COVID has nudged even the small corner shop retailer to find a way to iron out the creases in their home delivery and click and collect offers. The new demands from consumers do not seem to abate as restrictions lift. They have become accustomed to better choice and quality service – an experience they’ve now come to expect. The future of retail is giving the customer options that fit into their new “normal” way of life.

For everyone, in every walk of life, food shopping is a necessity, and the proliferation of brands makes it difficult to differentiate one from the other. To gain market share and encourage customer loyalty, retailers have begun to compete on customer experience rather than product selection or price. Retailers will increasingly rely on innovation to make shopping more of an experience whether that’s in person or online while consumers will make their grocery retail choice based on convenience and other beneficial experiences brought about by innovation in this space. Many retailers are craving new ideas to help them stand out from the crowd.  


New technology is creating opportunities for retailers to offer better experiences and compete in different ways. Refrigerated lockers are one of those emergent technologies that will be part of everyday life in the near future but for now, retailers with these lockers have first mover advantage. As digital natives move more into adulthood, buying houses and having children of their own, a digital solution for weekly grocery shopping is expected. But do retailers really want to get into a delivery / logistics business? Many would argue no and find refrigerated lockers to be the best hybrid solution for digital savvy, self-serve shoppers.

“In the new world where contactless and click and collect have become the norm, technology is helping retailers all over the world to keep up with these trends.  OOHPod will be the first smart locker solution in Ireland to bring refrigerated pods to Irish grocery retailers, helping them to provide an experience that customers have come to appreciate.” - John Tuohy, CEO, OOHPod

While refrigeration makes perfect sense for perishable items, food shopping is not their only use.  Pharmaceutical and medicinal products or flowers are other such examples that could use refrigeration for temporary or out of hours storage.

As a retailer one of the questions, you might battle with is when is the right time to engage with locker providers? Online food shopping is booming since the pandemic but still only in its infancy.  We believe online shopping with pick up and delivery services will grow over the next 5 years.  As technology supporting online grocery shopping matures, we expect the volume of online orders will grow and mature with it.  If you’re a retailer looking to get ahead of the curve, right now is the best time to have a conversation with a locker provider.

Four benefits of refrigerated lockers for grocery retailers

Exceptional Customer Experience

Using refrigerated lockers make for a seamless process making your shopping experience both quicker and contact free. When a customer has ordered online and is picking up their order that has been stored in a locker the experience couldn’t be easier. Go to the locker, enter your personal code, go to the open locker door, and collect your groceries. It really is as simple and as seamless as that. As workplaces begin to open, failed deliveries will become more common place, a costly and unnecessary inconvenience.  A refrigerated locker allows consumers to pick up their groceries at a time convenient to them – another great experience. 



Customer Choice and Satisfaction

In a lot of cases a retailer will outsource the delivery to a third party and in such cases lose an element of control over the customer experience. It is important for retailers to ensure end customer satisfaction to reinforce strong relationships with their e-tailer consumers. With a refrigerated locker solution, customers can choose to shop with their closest or most convenient retailer, whether it is the one nearest to their home, office or on their commute. Offering customers access to a locker will deliver the level of service savvy consumers have come to expect. Not only do lockers offer customer choice, but they also bring a seamless experience to the fore using an electronic log of activity and freeing up retail employees.



Competitive Advantage

As stated previously, retailers with the foresight to identify refrigerated lockers as a potential key differentiator and choose to adopt this new technology will have first mover advantage in the Irish market. Having a seamless click and collect strategy for your ecommerce consumers will offer a competitive advantage and will help for forge stronger relationships with customers.



A Greener Solution

Promoting locker pick up as a greener solution will reduce the demand for home deliveries. Not only is this a more cost-effective solution for retailers it is better for the environment too. The reduction in carbon emissions as a direct result of locker promotion could form part of a large retailer’s sustainable agenda.

If you would like to talk to us about a refrigerated locker for your business contact us on any of our social platforms or through hello@oohpod.com about becoming an OOHPod retailer.   OOHPod, your out of home delivery station, coming soon.

Refrigerated lockers open up new click & collect possibilities for grocery retailers. Find out more about refrigerated lockers from OOHPod.

OOHPod | Smart Parcel Lockers Ireland | Are Refrigerated Lockers The Future of Click & Collect?

Refrigerated lockers open up new click & collect possibilities for grocery retailers. 

Are Refrigerated Lockers The Future of Click & Collect?

As the country slowly reopens its doors and the post pandemic world begins to reveal itself it is becoming increasingly clear that things look quite a bit different. An obvious, and dramatic change is how the general workforce are affected. Advances in technologies have encouraged companies to challenge the status quo and plan for a more flexible, remote workforce of the future.  What does this mean for carriers?  Well, once people go back to their physical workplace either full time or as a hybrid model their home address is no longer their only address. Carriers may see a spike in redirect requests or increase in failed deliveries.

Not only are we facing change in our place of work but potentially in the way we commute.  A new report by the Oireachtas Climate Action Committee recommends the development of “cycle superhighways” in major cities, an approach with is deemed “radical” and “long-term.”  This approach aims to reduce the volume of traffic entering cities, thus reducing carbon emissions.  What does this mean for carriers? Ultimately this would reduce volume of traffic however, it will also seriously curtail road access for traffic into city centres. All carriers will need a more creative solution to accommodate for this change.

The growth in e-commerce and digital transformation have been widely touted as one of the most powerful outcomes of the crisis. Tánaiste Leo Varadkar has recently said that “people who never shopped online before now shop online and get deliveries as a matter of course, and that has changed, and it's not going to change back.” This is a key insight into the changing behaviour of consumers on a national level. What does this mean for carriers? The unprecedented surge in deliveries seen over the last 18 months will not be abating any time soon. Carriers will need a robust, long-term capacity and resource plan in place.

“We’re incredibly proud to be part of a sustainable last mile solution. The pandemic has seen a further explosion in online shopping and in peak season carriers are pushed to their limit. With our network of carrier agnostic parcel pods we will be able to relieve this pressure and bring a more environmentally friendly and safer solution to communities all around Ireland.” - John Tuohy, CEO, OOHPod

With flexibility and choice now a core part of everyday life, from working to shopping, and a strong emphasis on sustainability measures, consumer preference for alternate delivery locations is growing.

Three benefits of out of home solutions for parcel carriers.

Increase Delivery Efficiency 

Failed deliveries and costly re-directs due to customers being away from home will only increase as large parts of the country return to offices. Customers have become accustomed to getting orders to individual addresses in a timely fashion which means carriers will need to increase capacity. Parcel lockers are a means to tackle the challenges and costs posed by last mile deliveries from retailer’s warehouses to homes and offices.
 
Delivering to parcel lockers means a single delivery vehicle could drop off dozens of orders at the same time to each delivery location around the country. This reduces the number of vehicles required, their subsequent movements throughout towns and cities and increases the opportunity for first time successful delivery saving both time and money for carriers.

 

Customer Choice and Satisfaction

In most cases, consumers do not control the parcel carrier selection and view their relationship to be with the e-tailer. However, the last mile is an integral part of their overall shopping experience. It is important for carriers to ensure end customer satisfaction to reinforce strong relationships with their e-tailer clients. 
 
With parcel locker deliveries, customers can choose their closest or most convenient delivery point, whether it is the one nearest to their home, office or on their commute with the flexibility to change it every time they shop.  Offering customers access to a locker ecosystem that is not limited by store hours or carrier, but accessible to all 24×7 will deliver the level of service savvy consumers have come to expect.   
 
Not only do lockers offer customer choice, but they also bring an element of security to the transaction with complete tracking and accountability throughout the chain of custody, all without the need for customer signature which is replaced with an electronic log of activity.

 

Competitive Advantage

Large e-commerce players have identified last-mile services as a potential key differentiator versus their competitors. The variety of delivery options and the perceived quality of the delivery service are major decision criteria for online customers and hence directly impact e-commerce players’ bottom line. Having an out of home delivery strategy as a turn-key delivery and returns solution for your e-tailer clients will offer a competitive advantage and help to forger stronger relationships.


If you would like to make it easier for people to pick up parcels on their terms, 24x7, consolidate your deliveries and increase your first time delivery rate, contact us on any of our social platforms or through hello@oohpod.com about becoming an OOHPod carrier partner.  OOHPod, your out of home delivery station, coming soon.

Open network parcel lockers - a creative out of home parcel solution for all carriers. Get in touch to increase capacity and reduce failed deliveries.

OOHPod | Smart Parcel Lockers Ireland | Out Of Home Parcel Solution For Carriers

Open network parcel lockers - a creative out of home parcel solution for all carriers. 

Why Every Parcel Carrier Should Have an Out of Home Strategy

Internet savvy students are no strangers to online shopping or online swapping. With a huge number of orders placed each day, campus staff and accommodation managers face growing pressure to find creative solutions to manage parcel deliveries. A typical student residence could house about 500-600 students which means dealing with incoming parcels will be a full-time job for any one member of staff – a preventable, unnecessary cost.

The 2018/2019 academic year saw over 28,000 international student enrolments, more than double the amount recorded in 2011/2012*.  With restrictions set to lift for the 2021 / 2022 enrolments, there is no reason to expect this growth trend to dissipate any time soon. More students, especially international students, means more deliveries from both online and from family and friends abroad.

"It’s no secret that online shopping is on the rise and set to double by 2026. Space on campus is at a premium and traditional mailrooms are struggling. We want to help change that dynamic by bringing a smart parcel locker solution to every student campus in Ireland - big or small.” - John Tuohy, CEO, OOHPod

Adopting an open network locker solution designed with sustainability, convenience and security in mind means that, unlike with other locker providers, students can shop anywhere, and have it delivered directly to their locker no matter who the parcel carrier is. Having a contactless, open network, smart parcel locker solution on campus simply makes sense.


In the wake of COVID-19, many colleges and universities will likely adjust their approach to student housing to accommodate social distance rules. For example, some schools may only offer single rooms with ensuite bathroom instead of double or triple rooms with communal bathroom options. More communal recreation areas may be built, or areas revamped to safely house fewer students. One way or another campus and student accommodation managers will need to find creative solutions to reduce contact instances between students, especially when it comes to communal space.


With all parcels tracked and pickups and drop offs monitored by built in security cameras, packages are in safe hands. Automated notifications mean that students will know exactly when their package has arrived, and it will remain safe in a locker until they are ready to collect.


The benefits of smart parcel lockers are not just for students.With a little bit of creative thinking campus administration staff can use the lockers to help minimise contact, especially when it comes to mass distribution of physical necessities such as student ID cards or room keys. Using secure lockers to support administration tasks could streamline clunky processes and will help reduce traffic or crowd congregations in specific locations at busy times e.g enrolment days or RAG week.

OOHPod provides modular and customisable locker systems for sending, receiving, and returning parcels with an inbuilt smart technology solution that sends automated text messages to residents as soon as their package is ready for collection. Hosting a smart parcel locker system designed for student accommodation offers a cost saving, convenient and secure delivery solution for students.

If you would like to make it easier for staff and residents to manage parcel delivery, securely and with 24*7 access contact us on any of our social platforms or through hello@oohpod.com.  OOHPod, your out of home delivery station. Coming Soon.

*Source: www.hea.ie

A parcel locker from OOHPod will revolutionise your student campus. Make parcel pick ups and returns simple for your students. Get in touch today.

OOHPod | Smart Parcel Lockers Ireland | Parcel Lockers For Students

A parcel locker from OOHPod will revolutionise your student campus. Make parcel pick ups and returns simple for your students. 

How Parcel Lockers Revolutionise Student Residence