DISTRIBUTION group Exel has won a six-year contract with Boots to store and distribute its Christmas giftware lines in Worcester, providing up to 250 jobs for the city.

The value of the contract will be in the region of £40m, and the operation will be based at a 370,000sq ft site in the Shire Business Park, Warndon, which Boots has recently leased specifically to handle the work.

Activity will be concentrated between July and the following January, to supply the Christmas demand.

It is planned that the Exel site will become the seasonal operation centre for Boots UK and will handle other occasional lines throughout the year.

"Exel represents the combination of strategic thinking, ability to integrate with our processes and strong systems of its own that we were looking for," said Mark Langrish, senior category manager for Boots.

"Christmas is a critical part of our commercial offering and requires an expert third party logistics provider to manage the supply chain successfully, working with us on a long-term partnership basis to achieve year-on-year improvements in the operation."

Exel will be handling some 3,000 Christmas product lines with ranges including health and beauty products and adventure experience vouchers.

The majority of the goods coming into Worcester will be arriving from Boot's UK manufacturing plants and contract suppliers, although an additional 20 per cent will come from the Far East.

Initially, approximately 40 new warehouse staff will be employed there, rising to about 250 during the peak period each year.

"Building on our existing relationship with Boots in the UK and Thailand, Exel has demonstrated its ability to respond with a fresh approach to a specific logistics requirement," said Simon Payne, business director for Exel.

"We are very pleased to have won the business and are confident that we can provide significant service enhancements and cost-efficiencies."

Exel, which employs 74,000 people across the UK, and has an annual turnover of more than £200m, also announced contracts with Burberry, Mothercare and Spar in other parts of the country.