Behind Every Parcel Are People: What Years of Working With PostNL Have Taught Us

Forty-four years with one organisation is a remarkable career. In his farewell message, Raymond thanked Gerrit for the collaboration, support and professionalism he had experienced over the years. Just as importantly, he thanked him for his friendship.

That distinction matters. A professional relationship can begin with a business conversation and become something people value well beyond the next transaction. Familiarity develops, trust grows, and the person on the other side of the table becomes someone whose company you enjoy.

Raymond’s tribute begins with a simple observation: with some people, you just have that good feeling. The lunch was an opportunity to acknowledge it, and to wish Gerrit well as he starts a well-earned retirement.

Over the years, Raymond and Gerrit often joked about catching the big fish: those dream customers every business hopes to win.

Sometimes they talked about them. Sometimes they chased them. Every now and then, they caught one.

The phrase became part of their shared language. Bringing a PostNL-coloured fish to the retirement lunch was therefore an appropriate reference to the conversations and opportunities they had enjoyed together.

There is no need to turn the anecdote into a list of accounts or commercial achievements. Its value is in the recognition. A familiar joke can carry years of shared experience in a way that a formal thank-you never quite manages.

Raymond put the underlying idea into words in his LinkedIn tribute:

“Behind every successful partnership are people who genuinely care, have the right set of values, keep their promises, and make doing business enjoyable.”

Raymond, in his LinkedIn retirement tribute

Technology, automation and data all have important roles in fulfilment. Software helps information move between systems. Warehouse processes help orders move from stock to dispatch. Delivery networks connect businesses with customers.

But people still have to understand what a customer needs, explain an exception and decide what to do next. A system can show that something has happened; a useful conversation helps establish what it means and how to respond.

Trust is built through those exchanges. Clear communication, realistic commitments and reliable follow-through help businesses work together over time. Knowing when to ask a question is part of that professionalism, as is being honest about what can be delivered and what still needs to be agreed.

For an ecommerce customer, fulfilment is one connected experience. The customer orders a product and expects it to arrive. The organisational boundaries between a brand, a warehouse and a carrier are rarely the customer’s main concern.

The journey runs from inventory to order, through picking and packing, into suitable packaging, onto a shipping service, through a carrier network and finally to delivery.

A warehouse can pick the correct item and pack it carefully, but the parcel still has a journey ahead. Equally, the shipping options available may influence the packaging choices made before dispatch. Looking at each activity in isolation can miss those connections.

That is why dependable relationships across the chain matter. Understanding one another’s requirements helps the parties ask better questions before a problem arises and communicate more clearly when plans need to change.

For a growing brand, this is also a reason to discuss fulfilment and shipping early. Packaging should protect the product, while the service choice should reflect the destination and customer promise. The people responsible for each stage need a shared understanding of that promise.

Vareya is a Netherlands-based ecommerce fulfilment company serving international ecommerce brands, with a particular focus on compact and lightweight products. Its approach brings fulfilment, warehousing, packaging and shipping into the same conversation.

Small products still require careful decisions. A supplement container, skincare item, piece of jewellery or accessory may be compact, but its packed dimensions, weight and protection needs influence the appropriate format and shipping options. Product category alone does not establish suitability.

Vareya’s philosophy is expressed in three short lines: Ship smaller. Spend less. Grow faster.

That is an optimisation objective, not a promise of a particular saving. The useful starting point is the actual product and order profile: what needs protection, how items are combined, where orders are going and which services fit those requirements.

Thinking beyond the warehouse door means considering the parcel that enters the delivery network as well as the item on the shelf.

Many ecommerce businesses with international ambitions sell products that fit into a relatively small space. The size of the parcel says little about the scale of the brand’s plans.

Small parcel fulfilment and lightweight fulfilment start with those physical characteristics. Vareya uses Boxable Fulfilment™ to describe its approach to fulfilment for small, light products suitable for parcel packaging. Boxable Shipping™ brings the packed shipment and appropriate shipping options into that same assessment.

Letterbox-friendly fulfilment can be relevant where the packed order and chosen service allow it. It is a suitability question, not an assumption that every small product belongs in a letterbox format.

The connection to the big fish story is a modest one: a business can have ambitious plans while paying close attention to small details. Vareya’s product and packaging approach is its own proposition; this tribute does not present it as a PostNL endorsement.

Vareya has worked with PostNL over the years. The relationship described here is illustrated by Raymond’s long-standing professional relationship with Gerrit van Estrik, who retired after 44 years at PostNL. Raymond’s account highlights collaboration, support, professionalism and friendship, including their recurring joke about winning dream customers. It is a personal example of the people behind a working relationship, rather than an announcement of an exclusive agreement or a new strategic alliance between the two businesses.

It is natural to compare logistics providers through rates, systems, warehouses, automation and delivery options. These are practical considerations, and a warm relationship does not remove the need to assess them properly.

Yet a comparison on paper cannot tell the whole story. How people listen, communicate and follow through becomes clearer over time. So does their willingness to understand another business rather than treating every conversation as an isolated transaction.

Raymond’s farewell to Gerrit returns to those values: care, support, professionalism, trust, keeping promises and enjoying doing business together.

The lunch and the fish are memorable because they make that appreciation tangible. They mark a relationship that Raymond values, and a career that deserves to be celebrated on its own terms.

Gerrit, thank you for the collaboration, your support, your professionalism and, above all, your friendship. It has been a pleasure working with you over the years.

After 44 years at PostNL, there are probably not many fish left to catch.

Wishing you calm waters, new adventures and many happy years ahead. Enjoy your retirement. You have more than earned it.