Tonight, the world celebrates the start of the Vancouver Olympic Games. For the UPS team assisting with the London Olympics, it is a milestone on the journey to the 2012 Summer Games.

Organising an Olympic Games is the single biggest peacetime logistical event in the world, followed just two weeks later by the second biggest – the Paralympic Games. The starting point for us came by installing a team of skilled UPS logistics professionals into LOCOG’s HQ to start the planning process. I am leading the team, assisted by six other UPSers with expertise in warehousing, transportation, venue and village logistics, customs and freight forwarding, and courier services. As a project, it is unique. In addition to its size and complexity, there is obviously zero flexibility when it comes to the implementation date – 27th July 2012. There’s only one chance to get it right!

The first four months of planning have been intensive. We’re fortunate at UPS to have a lot of Olympic experience and expertise so part of our preparation has included sessions with the UPSers in China who successfully delivered the Beijing 2008 Olympic logistics. The opportunity to work with the individuals who lived and experienced the Beijing Games was invaluable.  Beijing has become an important reference point, however we all realise that London 2012 will be very different.

Warehouse selection has started and we plan to have the first warehouse operational by late 2010. By 2012, UPS will be operating nearly one-million square feet of warehousing to support the Games. UPS is also involved in all the venue planning sessions. The venues range from existing stadiums to new-build stadiums, plus venues that are currently public spaces – for example roads where some cycling events and the marathon will take place.

We’ve also had the valuable opportunity of visiting the VANOC logistics team. VANOC is the Organising Committee of the Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver. We spent 10 days with VANOC prior to Christmas studying their planning processes, IT systems and visiting their warehouse and venues. The Winter Games are roughly one-third the size of the Summer Games, but many of the processes are similar so it was a great learning experience.

The UPS team helped move Team GB (Great Britain) to the Vancouver Winter Games. Team GB has 43 athletes competing at the Winter Games.  We started the process at the beginning of January with the shipping of an ocean container full of equipment. The container arrived in Vancouver after traveling by rail across Canada. At the end of January, we moved a number of more time-sensitive air freight shipments containing – among other things – bobsleighs for the reigning Bobsleigh World Champions; the women’s GB team, the men’s bobsleighs, skis and uniforms for the athletes and officials.

To keep track of UPS and our involvement with the London 2012 Olympics, visit ups.com/london2012.