In Asia Pacific alone, DHL has invested $1.4 billion to provide leading edge infrastructure for customers. These investments have been especially important to customers such as American Pacific, a major home decorating and textiles manufacturer with offices and factories in Karachi, Pakistan; New Delhi; Hong Kong and Shanghai.

American Pacific creates new fabric and product ideas for goods that consumers find in just about every room of their homes - from quilts and comforters to window treatments and hardware. These products are bound for the largest, most well-known U.S. retail stores, as well as American Pacific's own online store. American Pacific has relied heavily on DHL to ensure its home décor business receives the support needed from concept to distribution.

"We switched to DHL because we needed a total solution, and DHL had a strong network in the U.S. and Asia, as well as cross-border expertise to handle all of our time-critical sample and finished goods shipments for international import and export," said Gary Gleckner, Executive Vice President of Operations at American Pacific. "After switching to DHL, we discovered improved consistency and visibility utilizing one full service provider."

For American Pacific, each design concept involves sending samples to several offices and factories for expert review. This process also involves sourcing raw material, as well as development of textile design for prototypes and finished goods. Since manufacturing is primarily done overseas, American Pacific understood that a carrier with the infrastructure, knowledge of local customs, and ability to move product quickly between the U.S. and the Asia Pacific region could be an important asset.

Earlier this year, DHL's air network added flights to further speed consignments between India and the U.S. The flights within the Asia-Pacific region to India originate in Malaysia and Singapore and the U.S. bound flights from India are routed via Europe. DHL Express handles more than 1,200 tons of outbound consignments per year from India to the U.S. - including samples, documents, spare parts to semi-finished and finished goods. South India is a very important market for DHL, given that the IT, textile, automobile and other critical industries are prevalent in that part of the world.

Consolidating all distribution through DHL and having one global contract enabled American Pacific to have in-country representation wherever they are around the world. "This means that DHL can meet with manufacturers and distributors at each of our locations to optimize the shipment process and implement appropriate technology applications anywhere in the world," Gleckner explained. Other competitors required American Pacific to have separate contracts in each country they conduct business as well as a separate point of contact by location.

The result to date has meant improved order response time for American Pacific customers. In addition to DHL's central role in the company's product development process, American Pacific is now using DHL exclusively to handle shipping and logistics for its e-commerce direct-to-consumer business at www.DesignerLinensOutlet.com.