We prioritize strategic and sustainable growth. This helps us meet the responsibility we have as a major employer at many locations.

As a logistics provider, we offer a wide range of services at central interfaces between producers, retailers and consumers. This includes production supply and goods distribution as well as vehicle transport by road, rail and water. The demands on logistics are changing at an ever-increasing pace. The main drivers are ongoing globalization, ever shorter product life cycles, rapidly advancing urbanization in many parts of the world and, not least, new technologies. We face challenges in particular from the unrelenting pressure on margins and the shortage of skilled and junior staff, which is closely linked to demographic developments. Other factors include the further marked increase in the relevance of e-commerce as a result of the pandemic, growing customer expectations regarding speed, flexibility and quality of delivery, and greater environmental awareness on the part of customers. The future development of the coronavirus pandemic remains a risk that has to be factored in. The war in Ukraine, which we are following with great concern, will also have far-reaching effects, although it is too soon to quantify these at present. We again expect supply chains to be disrupted, resulting in production losses for our customers, and energy prices to remain extremely high. In addition, it is to be assumed that we will have to suspend our operations in both countries temporarily or in the longer term, or that the basis for doing business will cease altogether. On this basis and given the current highly dynamic situation, it is virtually impossible to make any concrete forecasts.

Financial management

As part of BLG LOGISTICS’ mission and vision and the sharpening of our strategic guidelines, we designed the management system to be as clear and transparent as possible. The key performance indicators on which internal reporting and remuneration systems below the level of the Board of Management are based are revenue, earnings before taxes (EBT) and the EBT margin derived from both of these. By resolution of the Annual General Meeting on June 2, 2021, a new remuneration system for the Board of Management was introduced with retroactive effect from January 1, 2021, which includes both financial and non-financial target indicators: Earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT), return on capital employed (RoCE), CO₂ emissions, the trainee ratio and the 1,000-employee rate based on work-related accidents. We plan to apply these key performance indicators to other levels throughout the Group in the future. For more information, see the Fundamental Information about the Group - Group Control section in the Financial Report 2021.

Despite adverse market conditions and the continued negative repercussions of the coronavirus pandemic on the global economy, we were able to substantially improve our results in the 2021 financial year and thus impressively achieve our original forecast. Following the marked upturn in the economy and global trade, as well as private consumption, that initially set in during the spring and summer, the recovery lost momentum again from the third quarter onwards due to increasing infection rates – also caused by the new Omicron variant. At the same time, supply bottlenecks, particularly for intermediate goods in the automotive industry, eased again somewhat toward the end of the year, while inflationary pressure increased. This was compounded by significantly higher prices for crude oil and energy. On the other hand, the CONTAINER Division benefited from catch-up effects from the coronavirus pandemic and significantly increased container throughput. In particular, the temporary much higher income from storage fees resulting from turbulence in the global supply chains had a positive impact on earnings. The increased diversification of our business in recent years continues to give us a high degree of stability.

Group revenue declined slightly year on year by EUR 14.8 million to EUR 1,050.4 million, a decrease of around 1.4 percent. By contrast, EBT increased markedly by EUR 168.3 million to EUR 52.2 million. Correspondingly, the EBT margin was 5.0 percent, which is not only significantly higher than the previous year’s figure of –10.9 percent, but also higher than in the pre-COVID year 2019 (3.2 percent). The financial management of BLG LOGISTICS is detailed in depth in our Financial Report 2021. Although we currently expect 2022 to be characterized by challenging conditions and imponderables due to the war in Ukraine as well as the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, we are nevertheless working intensively to constantly improve BLG LOGISTICS’ overall financial situation and, despite these uncertain times, believe we are well positioned for the future.