Competitors
Major domestic (United States) competitors include United States Postal Service (USPS) and FedEx. In addition to these domestic carriers, UPS competes with a variety of international operators, including Canada Post, Purolator, DHL Express, Deutsche Post (and its subsidiary DHL), Royal Mail, Japan Post, India Post and many other regional carriers, national postal services and air cargo handlers (see Package delivery and Mail pages).
Historically, the bulk of UPS' competition came from inexpensive ground-based delivery services, such as Parcel Post (USPS) or Choice Logistics. But in 1998 FedEx expanded into the ground parcel delivery market by acquiring RPS (originally Roadway Package System) and rebranding it as FedEx Ground in 2000. In 2003 DHL expanded its US operations by acquiring Airborne Express, significantly increasing its presence in the United States, and adding more competition in the ground delivery market. In response to this, UPS partnered with the US Postal Service to offer UPS Mail Innovations, a program that allows UPS to pick up mail and transfer it to a USPS center, or destination delivery unit (DDU), for final distribution. This process is also known as zone skipping, long used by Parcel Consolidators.
More recently, the continued growth of online shopping, combined with increasing awareness of the role transportation (including package delivery) has on the environment, has contributed to the rise of emerging competition from niche carriers or rebranded incumbents. For instance, the US Postal Service claims "greener delivery" of parcels on the assumption that USPS letter carriers deliver to each US address, six days a week anyway, and therefore offer the industry's lowest fuel consumption per delivery. Other carriers, like ParcelPool.com, which specializes in residential package delivery to APO-FPO addresses, Hawaii, Alaska, Puerto Rico and other US Territories, arose in response to increased demand from catalog retailers and online e-tailers for low-cost residential delivery services closely matching service standards normally associated with more expensive expedited parcel delivery.
Read more about this topic: United Parcel Service