Colgate-Palmolive, Johnson & Johnson and Reckitt Benckiser are among the major companies to be served by a new Logistics Campus, to be opened this fall in Germany by DHL Exel Supply Chain. Located in the city of Unna, within the county of North Rhine-Westphalia, the venture has been designed expressly for brand manufacturers of cosmetics and cleaning agents. Colgate-Palmolive and Johnson & Johnson will be among the charter tenants at the campus, which initially will cover 645,000 square feet. Reckitt Benckiser will move in during the middle of 2008, with the addition of 215,000 square feet. All logistics services offered by DHL in nearby Dortmund will relocate to Unna by the end of the year. DHL Exel Supply Chain is a newly branded subsidiary of Deutsche Post World Net, serving a variety of industries. For cosmetics and cleaning-agent manufacturers, the company has created a center that will address common issues such as frequently changing assortments and seasonal capacity logjams. According to DHL, the campus concept ensures uniform standards in warehousing and transportation processes, as well as IT systems. Identical hall designs allow DHL's services to be adapted to customers' changing needs for warehouse capacity. Andre van den Broek, who oversees the consumer-goods business of DHL Exel Supply Chain in Germany, said the venture was launched to offer customers more flexibility and a higher quality of service. Colgate-Palmolive chose DHL as its new logistics partner in Germany and Austria because of the campus concept, said Cornelia Creischer, managing director of commercial logistics. "The future starts in Unna," she said.
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