Transcripts
These are the next few months that'll make or break your business, and
Speaker:for some companies, this will decide whether or not you get to continue
Speaker:selling things online next year.
Speaker:It's the next few months.
Speaker:So this actually really matters.
Speaker:This isn't just something shipping nerds talk about, peak season.
Speaker:This is the peak pressure point of the year for people that are trying to
Speaker:make the world of ecommerce and making sure goods get safely to billions
Speaker:of end consumers work smoothly.
Speaker:This, this is the most important time of the year to do that.
Speaker:Welcome to
Speaker:Unboxing Logistics.
Speaker:I'm your host, Lori Boyer of EasyPost, and today is a podcast episode that
Speaker:I've been kind of having a hard time sleeping 'cause I've been really excited.
Speaker:I've got my good friend, Joe Dieter, here with us, and we're gonna be
Speaker:talking about the upcoming peak season.
Speaker:We're gonna be talking about the biggest concerns that we're
Speaker:seeing our audience face today.
Speaker:We're gonna talk cost.
Speaker:We're gonna talk carriers.
Speaker:Carriers is kind of our, our bread and butter.
Speaker:We eat, sleep, drink carriers here at EasyPost.
Speaker:And so I have brought in my friend, Joe Dieter.
Speaker:He is an expert on everything to do with carriers, peak, shipping.
Speaker:I mean, y'all, this guy just doesn't do anything except think about shipping.
Speaker:I think that's- it's his major passion.
Speaker:Joe, introduce yourself.
Speaker:He's back again.
Speaker:He's one of our favorites.
Speaker:But Joe for people who somehow have missed you, well, introduce
Speaker:yourself to our audience.
Speaker:Well, thanks for the kind words.
Speaker:Yeah, so I'm, I'm here at EasyPost.
Speaker:We're teammates.
Speaker:And we are excited.
Speaker:I mean, this is the most important time of the year for us, and for the
Speaker:thousands and thousands of shippers and companies we work with, and
Speaker:the hundred carriers we work with.
Speaker:This is the most critical next few months.
Speaker:And so I'll, I'll start there, that we're excited about that.
Speaker:I am with our products team and, and product marketing, so we sit right between
Speaker:product and, and growth here at EasyPost.
Speaker:But we get to chat with a lot of customers And we have empathy, 'cause listen,
Speaker:like if, if you are selling things online or you're a 3PL helping people
Speaker:fulfill orders that are selling things online, these are the next few months
Speaker:that'll make or break your business.
Speaker:And for some companies, this will decide whether or not you get to continue
Speaker:selling things online next year.
Speaker:It's the next few months, so this actually really matters.
Speaker:This isn't just something shipping nerds talk about, peak season.
Speaker:This is the peak pressure point of the year for people that are trying to
Speaker:make the world of ecommerce and making sure goods get safely to billions
Speaker:of end consumers work smoothly.
Speaker:This, this is the most important time of the year to do that.
Speaker:So there's a lot that comes across our desk and we're excited to,
Speaker:to talk about what we're learning.
Speaker:I am really excited.
Speaker:We, this year we did a peak preparedness survey.
Speaker:Really really fun.
Speaker:Really cool.
Speaker:We were able to connect with a bunch of shippers and kind of get the, put
Speaker:our, our finger on the pulse a little bit of what people are nervous about,
Speaker:what people are anticipating, and so we're gonna kinda talk about that.
Speaker:What was interesting… Well, there was something that was
Speaker:not interesting and interesting.
Speaker:One of our top concerns is cost.
Speaker:That's the part that's kind of not interesting, 'cause it's always costs.
Speaker:We're always… But also, and I thought this was, was kind of a new
Speaker:emerging thing, carrier complexity.
Speaker:The, the challenges of carriers these days.
Speaker:There's a lot going into that.
Speaker:So- What do you think is driving specifically kind of that focus
Speaker:on both costs and carriers?
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:Well, as you said, your team did a lot of, a ton of work on this.
Speaker:You basically surveyed, you spoke with hundreds of shippers, say,
Speaker:"Hey, what is keeping you up at night as we go into the holiday season?
Speaker:As we go into the most important time of the year, peak season, what
Speaker:are you most concerned about?" As you said, not surprisingly, costs,
Speaker:one of the big concerns, and it's actually specifically surcharges,
Speaker:which we can get into if you want to.
Speaker:We've, like, invented over the past 24 months new types of surcharges
Speaker:every few months in this industry.
Speaker:And we get why it's happening, but shippers are feeling the heat.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:The other part of it though that's connected is managing multiple carriers.
Speaker:So if you're getting hit with tons of charges from one carrier, and you're
Speaker:concerned about them being able to have perfect uptime and be reliable
Speaker:during the busiest time of the year, you tend to wanna have other carriers
Speaker:at play too in how you ship, right?
Speaker:That's what it means to be ultimately multi-carrier.
Speaker:But there's a lot of complexity.
Speaker:I think it's nearly one out of four shippers you spoke with said
Speaker:actually even more than cost, it's just juggling multiple carriers.
Speaker:I know the smartest way to ship this holiday season is not just to
Speaker:use that big four national carrier I've been using the past few years.
Speaker:I know I need to use other carriers, but to be honest, either I don't know
Speaker:where to start, or I do know where to start, it looks like way too much work.
Speaker:I don't know if I can trust some of these exciting new carriers.
Speaker:Like, I'm hearing all these names that they sound like startups.
Speaker:I don't know, can I depend on them?
Speaker:Yes, yes.
Speaker:You know, what, what is a UniUni or a GOFO?
Speaker:These are carriers we love and a lot of our shippers are now
Speaker:using 'cause they're… which we're gonna talk about more.
Speaker:But when people hear these names, it's not UPS, it's not FedEx.
Speaker:So that, when, when we say multi-carrier complexity is one of the reasons a lot
Speaker:of folks in the ecom world are dealing with migraines over the next few months.
Speaker:We're starting to get into the reality that today, to ship in a way where
Speaker:you're gonna save money, and you're gonna have the fastest time in transit,
Speaker:and you're not gonna lose a lot of your profit through the holiday season, you
Speaker:can't just rely on those big nationals?
Speaker:Perhaps.
Speaker:But okay, so how do you not just rely on the big nationals?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:That's, that's the big theme we see.
Speaker:The question.
Speaker:And I, I wanna dive in.
Speaker:You mentioned surcharges.
Speaker:So once upon a time, surcharges were kind of this peak season only
Speaker:thing, and, you know, we, we had our holiday surcharges we expected.
Speaker:They were kind of similar.
Speaker:The amount of surcharges has gone up dramatically.
Speaker:The types of surcharges things that are happening outside of peak and every
Speaker:carrier has slightly different surcharges.
Speaker:What, I guess, what are we seeing with that?
Speaker:What are we s- how are people managing that?
Speaker:What, what… Tell us a little bit about the surcharge.
Speaker:Dive into that a little bit more.
Speaker:People are concerned about cost.
Speaker:They always are, but this year it's not just paranoia.
Speaker:It's not just as usual.
Speaker:It's legitimate.
Speaker:Actually, I'm, I'm gonna grab some notes as we talk through this, 'cause it's,
Speaker:it's pretty interesting as you look at it.
Speaker:So you have one major carrier who added on their demand surcharge.
Speaker:This is kind of their peak season surcharge.
Speaker:It's 50 cents per package more expensive this year than previously.
Speaker:You have another major carrier who has multiple types of surcharges.
Speaker:Like, one is around dimensions and weight basically.
Speaker:What does that mean?
Speaker:Well, well- I am gonna ship a box this peak season.
Speaker:That exact same size box last peak season, notably cheaper.
Speaker:In addition, that same carrier added on a notable fuel surcharge, 8% plus, and
Speaker:this is a carrier we love, and most of the world shippers, most of the American
Speaker:shippers will rely on in some capacity.
Speaker:I wanna, I wanna jump in here and say, you know as followers
Speaker:of Unboxing Logistics, but we are carrier agnostic, I like to say.
Speaker:We love all our carriers.
Speaker:We work with every carrier out there.
Speaker:So this is just kind of what we're seeing naturally.
Speaker:Love our big four carriers as well, but there are challenges.
Speaker:So yeah, go ahead.
Speaker:These are the most popular kids on the block.
Speaker:These are the carriers that everyone wants to work with, needs
Speaker:to work with, needs to rely on.
Speaker:We know them, we love them.
Speaker:They've been with us every peak season for decades.
Speaker:But here's the reality.
Speaker:Shippers are like, "I wanna work with them," but also, okay, base rates are up 4
Speaker:to 9% across the major national carriers.
Speaker:Ground rates are 40% across major national carriers where they were in 2018.
Speaker:So in less than 10 years, we've never seen this sort of jump in
Speaker:base rates of what it means to ship a parcel package across the US.
Speaker:Especially residential, which in the peak season is so rough, but we're
Speaker:seeing really high residential charges.
Speaker:On that note, we have new surcharges popping up kind of every few months.
Speaker:We have a res- we have all sorts of residential surcharges, we
Speaker:have oversized package surcharges, we have multiple types of fuel
Speaker:surcharges, we have area surcharges.
Speaker:So like if you ship to a certain area extra fees, and shippers are looking at
Speaker:all this and saying, "I don't have the room in my wallet, in my bottom line,
Speaker:to continue to roll with these charges."
Speaker:So what is the alternative?
Speaker:Another thing that's happening with the big national carriers is they're coming
Speaker:out in the press over the past one to two years and saying, "Listen, we're
Speaker:actually prioritizing more profitable types of shipments like cold chain."
Speaker:the GLP-1 craze, the pharma the, the increase in a number of pharma-based
Speaker:shipments that need a certain temperature and a certain environment to ship
Speaker:safely, those are very profitable shipments for big carriers to focus on.
Speaker:So rightfully so, they're saying, "We're businesses. We're intrigued
Speaker:to service more of those more lucrative and higher touch
Speaker:shipments," like for the GLP-1 craze.
Speaker:What that means, though, is there's always a trade-off.
Speaker:If some of the big national carriers you relied on as an ecom company
Speaker:during peak are maybe more focused on cold chain in some way, you are
Speaker:not the priority as much anymore.
Speaker:So for all those awesome ecommerce brands or even those 3PLs that are gonna make
Speaker:the holiday season move literally, they're the ones that are gonna make sure every-
Speaker:under everyone's tree, there's presents.
Speaker:They're looking and saying, "The big nationals, some of them may not
Speaker:as be as focused on me anymore."
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:They're adding more fees to ship through them.
Speaker:They seem to be prioritizing other types of specialty shipments.
Speaker:So where do I go?
Speaker:What do I do?
Speaker:I need a backup at the very least.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And it's hard though, Joe.
Speaker:I think that sometimes people are surprised by this stat.
Speaker:For enterprise shippers, the majority are using additional
Speaker:carriers outside of the big three.
Speaker:I think that sometimes people are surprised that even the largest
Speaker:shippers out there are using some of these smaller carriers at times.
Speaker:But people are still a little bit resistant.
Speaker:It, it's, it feels safer to say to your boss, "Well, I used one of these
Speaker:big carriers, and they messed up," than, "I used a, a carrier maybe that
Speaker:nobody's heard of, and they messed up."
Speaker:And so, you know, what, do you feel like that expansion to additional
Speaker:carriers is where people expect?
Speaker:Is it further along than people expect?
Speaker:You know, what is the landscape you're seeing with that?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So a study came out, 55% of enterprise retailers, those are the big leading
Speaker:shippers that make peak season run, that make the holiday season happen,
Speaker:those big enterprise retailers, 55% no longer just use big three, big four.
Speaker:55% have some sort of, we call them a next gen innovative carrier.
Speaker:They're not that UPS, USPS, FedEx, DHL, the big ones we all know and rely on.
Speaker:They're a newer carrier that the vast majority now of the major retailers rely
Speaker:on as part of their multi-carrier mix.
Speaker:And so anytime you have the big enterprise retailers saying, "Listen,
Speaker:we're not exclusively with the nationals," something's happening.
Speaker:And I think what it is, is they have the data.
Speaker:They're looking at the dollars and cents, and they're looking at the average
Speaker:time in transit, and they're realizing that shipping to certain parts of the
Speaker:country and shipping within especially certain urban zip codes and doing
Speaker:it in a way where the end consumer is delighted and gets their package
Speaker:on time and it's in good condition, they're realizing they can no longer
Speaker:can use the big three exclusively.
Speaker:They're realizing they're actually getting a really great setup.
Speaker:They're getting better rates, faster time in transit, better support, maybe
Speaker:even more days more days of the week can, can experience a good pickup.
Speaker:There's all the fewer surcharges.
Speaker:There's all these benefits of this kind of next gen innovative carrier class that
Speaker:the, when you have the biggest enterprise retailers saying, "We're gonna use them."
Speaker:It's usually an indicator of where the rest of the market's gonna go.
Speaker:Where the rest of the shipping world is going to go.
Speaker:And these sorts of carriers, let's, let's name them out, like the GOFO's, the
Speaker:UniUni's, the Veho's these carriers have grown notably over the past couple years.
Speaker:Our projections are, and we're seeing specifically from we work,
Speaker:I don't know if we can say, we work with over 100,000 shippers.
Speaker:We'll say that.
Speaker:Over 100,000 shippers rely on EasyPost software to ship during peak.
Speaker:And we see more and more of them by the day bringing in these sorts of carrier
Speaker:names into their peak season carrier mix.
Speaker:And they're trying to do this right before the holiday season.
Speaker:Cause they're doing the math, and they're using our AI to get the
Speaker:projections of like, oh, wow, this new carrier I've never heard of or
Speaker:used has a faster time in transit than all the other major ground carriers.
Speaker:And it's less surcharge, and it's just as good coverage across the
Speaker:US if I combine them with, with one of the other new carriers.
Speaker:I think obviously the natural response for you all out there is
Speaker:like, "Okay, well, I'll go add some carriers. I'll put…" It's complex.
Speaker:You know, it's exactly what we talked about in the survey, the
Speaker:complexity of just adding a carrier.
Speaker:How do we know it's the right carrier?
Speaker:How do you know that it's going to be cheaper?
Speaker:How do you know it's gonna be reliable?
Speaker:How do… You know, it's not just as easy, I think, as just adding a carrier.
Speaker:W- what, how do you, how do you respond to that, you know?
Speaker:If everyone should be using some of these new carriers in their multi-carrier mix,
Speaker:why isn't everyone doing it yesterday?
Speaker:Well, historically, to get spun up with a new carrier and say, "Okay, I'm, I'm using
Speaker:carrier A. I wanna try carrier B for part of my shipping volume," it was a journey.
Speaker:We have shippers come to us and say, "I've spent the past several business quarters
Speaker:negotiating with fill-in-the-blank carrier name to try to get the best rates I can.
Speaker:I feel like they're still giving me not great of rates.
Speaker:They wanna see proof that I'm gonna ship a ton of volume through them,
Speaker:but, like, I'm a growing seller.
Speaker:I didn't do a ton of volume last peak, but trust me, I will
Speaker:do a ton of volume this peak.
Speaker:But, like, they're, they're not quite there.
Speaker:I'm not getting the right contract in place, and it's been multiple months."
Speaker:I'm also… Or, or they come to us and say, "Hey, I just signed
Speaker:up with two new carriers in addition to my primary carrier.
Speaker:I now have multiple logins.
Speaker:I have multiple billing cycles.
Speaker:I have mul- I'm getting hit with multiple invoices from every angle.
Speaker:I had to hire someone full-time just to manage my carrier relationships, and
Speaker:I still am questioning if I actually got really good rate discounts or not."
Speaker:So the, this is not uncommon.
Speaker:This is usually what it meant to be a multi-carrier shipper.
Speaker:It was kind of a privilege, and usually you had to be a really big
Speaker:company to even have the overhead and bandwidth and time in the day to get a
Speaker:really awesome contract in place with multiple carriers, especially if you're
Speaker:dealing with big national carriers.
Speaker:These are the ones that the wor- all the world wants to ship through, all
Speaker:the, all the US wants to ship through.
Speaker:They're high in demand.
Speaker:They don't need you, growing retailer.
Speaker:Sadly, I need you.
Speaker:But they, Joe needs you, but yeah.
Speaker:So i- in terms of the pain point, and this gets into, Lori, which we've
Speaker:talked about before, what does it mean to go direct to a carrier and
Speaker:start that relationship as a shipper?
Speaker:If you're not one of the biggest brands and sellers in the world,
Speaker:it means buckle up 'cause this may turn into a near full-time job
Speaker:over the next few weeks or months.
Speaker:And so here we are going into the fall.
Speaker:We're, we're on the brink of peak, and a lot of shippers, I think we've seen
Speaker:7 out of 10 shippers say, "I don't have a multi-carrier backup plan.
Speaker:Like I, I have a primary carrier.
Speaker:I know I need others.
Speaker:I I don't have that backup plan," 7 out of 10 shippers. And the real thing
Speaker:is that they're looking and saying, "I don't have time to engage in that process
Speaker:of reaching out to maybe a UniUni or even reaching out to FedEx and changing
Speaker:my contract and changing my setup.
Speaker:It seems daunting.
Speaker:I assume I'm too late.
Speaker:I assume I don't even get to be a savvy multi-carrier."
Speaker:Yeah, I- that was one of the things in our, our survey that really surprised me
Speaker:was a really, you know, two out of three shippers had no contingency plan tested.
Speaker:Even our larger ones did not necessarily have, you know, if
Speaker:a problem went down with their carrier, what were they gonna do?
Speaker:Had they tested out this contingency?
Speaker:It- so as you were saying, do you think it's just they don't have time?
Speaker:They don't have, you know, the means?
Speaker:What, what, why is there this gap?
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Well, there, there's several things, right?
Speaker:Like what goes into time, then what goes into did you get the right contract?
Speaker:Did you get the r- did you get the right agreement in place with those carriers?
Speaker:Shippers will come to us and say, "Well, here's how much
Speaker:I'm paying for blank carrier.
Speaker:Is, is that a good rate?" And we're like, "Ah, it's actually pretty close
Speaker:to what we call retail." Actually, you pretty much got the starting point.
Speaker:So you were not able to negotiate, have a conversation to explain why
Speaker:you are in a situation where you should be getting certain discounts.
Speaker:We at Easy, at EasyPost we have something called EasyPost Wallet,
Speaker:and this is how you get access to those big national carriers everyone
Speaker:wants to work with, as well as some of these new innovative carriers.
Speaker:And the key with EasyPost Wallet, the reason we created it, is we had so many
Speaker:shippers that came to us and said, "Hey within the next few weeks, I need to be
Speaker:up and running with these two carriers.
Speaker:I've never spoken with them.
Speaker:I don't have a ton of historical volume to get really great rates.
Speaker:Can you help me?"
Speaker:So we created the EasyPost Wallet program to make sure you could come to us right
Speaker:on the brink of peak season, like now.
Speaker:And rather than spending months in negotiation just to get kind of a
Speaker:discount and get up and running, rather than spending months trying to test,
Speaker:the other thing is, okay, you get a great agreement, a contract in place.
Speaker:Have you tested whether or not that carrier and that service
Speaker:level works well at scale?
Speaker:A lot of folks go into peak season, they have a new carrier,
Speaker:and then things go down.
Speaker:The system doesn't work well with that new carrier.
Speaker:They didn't accurately test and ramp up.
Speaker:They hit incredible volumes in online sales, and then everything's piled
Speaker:up against a brick wall in some warehouse, and they realize we didn't
Speaker:have the right fully ready-to-go setup with those new carriers.
Speaker:So Wallet also cuts through that.
Speaker:We have shippers that come to us in a matter of days, they're up and
Speaker:running with multiple carriers, and they're getting great discounts.
Speaker:We have up to 88% discounts on certain service levels through Wallet.
Speaker:So you're mentioning discounts and service levels.
Speaker:I want some of our audience out there, Joe, that I speak with are kind of
Speaker:these smaller shippers, the ones you're talking about maybe haven't done as much.
Speaker:Can you even kind of back up and be really basic for a minute?
Speaker:Like, what is a retail rate versus, like, the discounted rates?
Speaker:What, what does it mean when you say, "Oh, you've got a retail rate"?
Speaker:Yeah, sure.
Speaker:So how much are you paying to ship a package through a UPS,
Speaker:a FedEx, a GOFO, a UniUni?
Speaker:When you first come to these carriers directly as a shipper and you express
Speaker:interest in using them, you are going to get certain rates, and you're gonna
Speaker:start having conversations about what are you ultimately gonna pay them to ship.
Speaker:When we think of retail rates, we think of rates where you're
Speaker:not getting a ton of discounts.
Speaker:Now, most shippers are not a Fortune 50 online brand or seller.
Speaker:You know, most shippers are not fill-in-the-blank incredible retail brand.
Speaker:So they come to these carriers and say, "Hey, I want an awesome discount. I'm
Speaker:gonna ship a ton of volume through you," and that's a back-and-forth conversation.
Speaker:If you don't have historical volumes where, "Hey, look at the
Speaker:past three holiday seasons, I've shipped this many million packages
Speaker:to these parts of the globe.
Speaker:I'm now gonna use you to do 70% of that.
Speaker:What do you say about giving me X amount of volume discount?" That conversation
Speaker:is not easy for most shippers 'cause they don't have five consecutive
Speaker:peak seasons of incredible volume.
Speaker:They're not a reliable, great customer for a carrier.
Speaker:So your discount is really low, but then in using the Wallet, EasyPost has
Speaker:then basically negotiated that discount using the massive volume we have
Speaker:through all our, our shippers, right?
Speaker:Our main thing of why we exist from the beginning was we connected the
Speaker:world's shippers with all the world's carriers, and through that process,
Speaker:we saw how all the carriers shipped.
Speaker:We had the data.
Speaker:We, we noticed what carriers did an awesome job working with what types of
Speaker:shippers and delivered on-time transit and delivered within reasonable costs.
Speaker:And so we, we started seeing what carriers and service levels work really well,
Speaker:then we created a unique partnership with those carriers and service levels,
Speaker:and we got awesome discount of rates across those carriers and service levels.
Speaker:So you can be a shipper that comes to us.
Speaker:It doesn't matter how big you are.
Speaker:It doesn't matter how, what kind of track record you have of shipping.
Speaker:You can come to us and get access to the type of rates that much larger
Speaker:shippers would've fought hard to get, because we're the one that have the
Speaker:relationship with those carriers.
Speaker:Yeah, no, that's, that's fantastic.
Speaker:I, I love that explanation.
Speaker:That's perfect.
Speaker:So, you know, we have what we say Wallet carriers.
Speaker:Okay?
Speaker:So these are some of these ones who have really great discounted rates.
Speaker:So let's say that somebody has gone and turned on Wallet carriers.
Speaker:They- they've added them.
Speaker:How do they know which, 'cause there's multiple Wallet carriers
Speaker:in there, including the big ones.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:How do they decide which carrier to use for which packages?
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:We have something called Luma AI.
Speaker:You're familiar with.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:I love AI, especially Luma AI.
Speaker:So we used to say something like rate logic or kind of an industry term, but
Speaker:now we just say, "Oh, it's Luma AI." If you wanna know how to get the best
Speaker:label every time, if you wanna know the ideal carrier and service level
Speaker:for every type of shipment, we now of course, in 2026, we have an AI that
Speaker:has seen over billions of historical shipments and knows, okay, you're this
Speaker:type of shipper shipping this type of package to this part of the country.
Speaker:According to our data, the best cost, the best time in transit is gonna be
Speaker:this exact carrier and service level.
Speaker:It's so cool.
Speaker:I just had to say, I'm gonna geek out.
Speaker:Joe's gonna be embarrassed by me, but AI has its uses, and a
Speaker:lot of times is not used well.
Speaker:But of all the things, y'all, we have so much data, and to be able to use
Speaker:AI to figure out just exactly what Joe's saying, which carrier for which
Speaker:package in which route and which service level makes the most sense for you.
Speaker:I, I mean, that is freaking cool.
Speaker:That's just awesome.
Speaker:Also, I wanna say Luma AI is part of EasyPost.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:It's not like an add-on.
Speaker:Like, EasyPost is built and functioning, powered by we like to say, the AI.
Speaker:Is that right?
Speaker:You're not going and, and paying an extra service to have Luma AI.
Speaker:Yes, and, and even right now, across the weeks ahead, for free,
Speaker:you'll get perhaps the most valuable insight you could have with Luma AI.
Speaker:You'll be able to get an estimate of how much money you could save if you
Speaker:started using different carriers and service levels than you currently are.
Speaker:And it's the perfect time right, right before peak to just say, "Hey, hey,
Speaker:Luma. Hey, all-knowing shipping advisor." " here's what I'm doing right now.
Speaker:Give me a quick reaction of maybe the ballpark of how much money I
Speaker:could be saving across the holiday season ahead if I use different
Speaker:carriers and service levels."
Speaker:Luma right now is uncovering over $50 million in untapped savings across
Speaker:some of the shippers who use, use us.
Speaker:Over $50 million in savings.
Speaker:Luma has, for one particular seller, recently saved them a
Speaker:couple million dollars and prevented over 200,000 late deliveries.
Speaker:And, by the way, just switching service levels within the
Speaker:existing carrier they were using.
Speaker:It wasn't-
Speaker:That's, isn't that crazy?
Speaker:They didn't even switch carriers.
Speaker:It was simply service level switching.
Speaker:You're losing millions of dollars, and two, I think it was over 270,000 customers
Speaker:are unhappy getting late deliveries simply 'cause you chose the wrong service level.
Speaker:Okay, I geeked us out too much.
Speaker:We, we took a little pivot towards AI, 'cause you all know how much I love AI.
Speaker:We can talk later.
Speaker:Let's focus back a little bit on these Wallet carriers.
Speaker:There's a few that you've mentioned.
Speaker:So historically, those of you who, you know, are EasyPost customers
Speaker:are already familiar with Wallet know we've had, you know, certain
Speaker:Wallet carriers for some time.
Speaker:But exciting news is that for this peak season, we are adding some additional
Speaker:Wallet carriers, and, and they're some of the ones that you kinda mentioned.
Speaker:So I would love to hear a little bit about those what's coming up, who they are.
Speaker:Do you wanna introduce us to those?
Speaker:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker:So Wallet, historically, you had the big national carriers, USPS,
Speaker:UPS, FedEx, DHL, Canada Post.
Speaker:Those are still within Wallet, and a lot of people using Wallet are
Speaker:relying on those big carriers we love.
Speaker:We now, in the weeks ahead here in the fall we have GOFO, UniUni,
Speaker:and Veho coming into Wallet.
Speaker:Now, w- why would we add in these newcomers into this mix of
Speaker:the prestigious big nationals?
Speaker:Part of it is we had so many shippers that are saying, "Hey, I wanna use GOFO.
Speaker:I wanna use UniUni.
Speaker:I wanna use Veho during the holiday season." Like, well, tell us more.
Speaker:We noticed shippers were actually combining GOFO and UniUni to ship
Speaker:ground across major urban markets.
Speaker:And what they were noticing is that they were getting better time in transit.
Speaker:With GOFO, we've had reports of 2.7 days on average ground transit if
Speaker:you're shipping within certain cities.
Speaker:Why does that matter?
Speaker:Well, that average ground transit compared to most of the major
Speaker:ground carriers is quite quick.
Speaker:That's how I'll put it.
Speaker:It's very quick.
Speaker:It almost is like expedited shipping in some ways.
Speaker:They're also noticing better rates and fewer surcharges, suspiciously.
Speaker:Way less surcharges on the invoice when they started using these other carriers.
Speaker:Some folks have also said they really feel like they're getting awesome support.
Speaker:They feel like they have a little bit more accessibility and can
Speaker:reach out to a human as they work with some of these newer carriers.
Speaker:And so people are getting creative and saying, "Hey, we're actually combining
Speaker:GOFO and UniUni, and they have replaced or they have taken all of our ground
Speaker:shipping volume, which is the majority of what we're gonna ship over the next few
Speaker:and most important months of the year."
Speaker:So we're like, "Interesting." And they're like, "Yeah, you, you
Speaker:guys need them ASAP." "You, you guys need to work with them ASAP.
Speaker:And they need to be within Wallet so we have that simplified billing,
Speaker:invoice, and experience." People wanna be able to put funds in their EasyPost
Speaker:Wallet, and those funds are able to be used for all the rate, all the rate
Speaker:shopping across all those carriers.
Speaker:Great point.
Speaker:We didn't quite explain how and why it's Wallet.
Speaker:So Wallet is not just, oh, a discounted carrier.
Speaker:Explain a little bit more about what Wallet is specifically.
Speaker:How that works.
Speaker:If I'm a shipper, let's say I'm hopping in- Yeah … What would it mean?
Speaker:We call it Wallet because what you really want, what we hear is, is a really big
Speaker:headache, is I'm using multiple carriers, but now I just want one centralized way to
Speaker:get billed, get invoiced, and to pay as I generate labels across multiple carriers.
Speaker:I'm tired of having three different logins and three different types of invoices to
Speaker:deal with, and I have different people in my company or my team that have access
Speaker:to each of those different carriers.
Speaker:It's a nightmare.
Speaker:I could be getting over- overcharged on my, on my bills.
Speaker:There's no way to know.
Speaker:If I just had one centralized wallet that I could make sure money's in
Speaker:it, and I can just start shipping.
Speaker:I use Luma AI, make sure I'm getting the, that right label every
Speaker:time across multiple carriers.
Speaker:EasyPost Wallet is that way in a matter of minutes, in some cases not even days.
Speaker:In a matter of minutes, I am u- up, I'm running, I'm ready to go, and
Speaker:my wallet is fully funded, so I can be a savvy multi-carrier shipper.
Speaker:Now I can ship as if I was a big Fortune 50 retailer, even
Speaker:though I am anything but.
Speaker:I'm a small new seller, and it's a scary holiday.
Speaker:Awesome.
Speaker:So let's say they've signed in, they're using Wallet.
Speaker:We got these new exciting carriers, which again, I love that you pointed out
Speaker:these carriers have been added because of customer requests as well as just data.
Speaker:You know, as we start to see our Luma AI is recommending these kind of carriers
Speaker:more and more, then we think, "Okay, may- maybe it's time to add them to
Speaker:the Wallet." So let's start with GOFO.
Speaker:I wanna talk about each one individually.
Speaker:I wanna know kind of a little bit about them and really who of my,
Speaker:my shippers out there listening might be the best fit for each one.
Speaker:So let's start with GOFO.
Speaker:So GOFO is this company that's newer to us by standards, but they're a newer
Speaker:carrier that has taken the US by storm.
Speaker:Okay, so 75% of the US is reached through GOFO.
Speaker:It's 98.5%.
Speaker:Let me… yeah, 98.5% on time.
Speaker:What we're hearing, if you're a mid-market to enterprise D2C commerce brand or
Speaker:you're a 3PL, let's say you're doing over 10,000 shipments a month up to
Speaker:millions of shipments per month, and you're shipping within the major urban
Speaker:markets of the US throughout the holiday season, throughout the last few months
Speaker:of the year, one of the best decisions you could possibly make is going to be to
Speaker:do some of that ground shipping through GOFO, is the best way I can put it.
Speaker:Now do you have to be exactly that sort of shipper, that size?
Speaker:And not necessarily, but the ones that are seeing the biggest savings and
Speaker:are really enjoying that quick 2.7-day average transit through GOFO the ones
Speaker:that are putting a lot of their ground volume into GOFO are in that segment.
Speaker:The costs, the speed, the ri- the reliability, the under three-day
Speaker:transit averages those are things that are really, really hard to find for
Speaker:the rate you're gonna get with GOFO.
Speaker:UniUni-
Speaker:Oh, yeah.
Speaker:I love UniUni.
Speaker:I wanna say we've had UniUni on the pod before.
Speaker:You've all seen them on a Meet the Carriers.
Speaker:They're such a fun carrier.
Speaker:I also think, if I remember right, and you can correct me, they have
Speaker:some great lack of surcharges.
Speaker:They do.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:I, I think they don't have residential.
Speaker:I, d- fuel.
Speaker:Fuel.
Speaker:Delivery area, residential surcharges, you will not see those with UniUni.
Speaker:Those big ones that we're really struggling with.
Speaker:Some, those residential, those, you know, your area.
Speaker:So th- those are really great advantages of UniUni.
Speaker:What else can you tell us about UniUni?
Speaker:Yeah, so apparel, footwear, cosmetics, some of the biggest, biggest shippers
Speaker:during the last few months of the year, a lot of them are saying, "Hey, what is
Speaker:the lowest cost ground option I can get when shipping within certain markets?"
Speaker:UniUni is turning out to be the answer to that for these sorts of shippers.
Speaker:Again, they love the, the no surcharges.
Speaker:A one to seven-day transit is this flexibility that certain
Speaker:shippers just don't see maybe with larger national carriers.
Speaker:They're also 98% on time.
Speaker:And then, yeah, 65% US coverage.
Speaker:But the sneaky, the kind of the sneaky insight we see is the savviest shippers
Speaker:we work with that are about to save a lot of money on ground shipping, they're
Speaker:combining GOFO and UniUni and getting-
Speaker:That's super interesting
Speaker:total United States coverage.
Speaker:Yeah, really cool.
Speaker:So those two match the coverage you would get through one of
Speaker:a, the big ground carriers.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And they're like, "And I'm also paying less money, and I'm getting-
Speaker:Yeah … better time of transit."
Speaker:And like you said earlier, Joe, the focus on them, you know, these
Speaker:shippers, especially during peak, who are sending holiday-type gifts.
Speaker:These are the kind of carriers where you are their priority.
Speaker:You are their focus.
Speaker:Our, our big carriers, they still love you, but yeah, they are kind of moving
Speaker:into the slightly more profitable for them kind of markets, which
Speaker:isn't residential a lot of the time.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:No, absolutely.
Speaker:We another one we're adding is of course Veho, and we don't wanna leave them out
Speaker:as well, but and, and so maybe, maybe even I'll, I'll get to come back and talk
Speaker:more about Veho as we have more shippers.
Speaker:But I would say GOFO and UniUni are we have a list that grows by the day
Speaker:of shippers that rely on EasyPost.
Speaker:And they're a powerhouse combo putting them together, and
Speaker:yeah, Veho is wonderful as well.
Speaker:I believe they have no residential surcharges.
Speaker:I think that they, let me see my notes here I think that they also
Speaker:ship seven days a week, and so, yeah.
Speaker:Fantastic, and we, we definitely have a growing audience who is being
Speaker:recommended to use Veho as well.
Speaker:So let's say, who of our listeners out there
Speaker:are, are gonna be best served by kind of looking into some of these new carriers?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Shippers of any size, whether you're SMB, mid-market enterprise, should
Speaker:reevaluate your carrier mix as you go into the holiday season, right?
Speaker:So as we're going into the last few months, look and say, "Who is every
Speaker:carrier service level I use?" And y- you'd be surprised how many shippers
Speaker:would say, "Well, there's actually only one carrier I'm still using."
Speaker:So first off, become multi-carrier if you wanna save the most amount of
Speaker:money, get the best time in transit not lose a ton of profit you're
Speaker:about to make across holiday season.
Speaker:Like, go multi-carrier if you wanna do those things.
Speaker:And don't feel bad if you are still doing the single carrier.
Speaker:I can tell you, Joe can tell you, there are many shippers out there
Speaker:who are in your shoes Yep and feeling bad of like, that little
Speaker:guilt of like, "I know I should be doing this." Yeah, you're not alone.
Speaker:But it is time.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It is time to make that move.
Speaker:Yeah, there, there's incredible brands that come to us that we
Speaker:realize are using one carrier.
Speaker:It just seems.
Speaker:And we're amazed
Speaker:… Amazing in this day.
Speaker:The people that are going into the future, and they're about to save a
Speaker:lot of money this holiday season, are getting more diversified than ever.
Speaker:What that means is they're, to them, it may be even risky.
Speaker:"Ah, I was using fill in the blank big national carrier the past five holiday
Speaker:seasons, and I'm scared I'm gonna take the leap, but I know I'm about to save
Speaker:maybe millions of dollars and have much happier customers this holiday season
Speaker:if I add in this exciting new carrier.
Speaker:I don't know how to pronounce their name, but I'll add 'em in because the
Speaker:data, the AI, is telling me it's time.
Speaker:It's time to gr- to step into the future and maybe diversify my multi-carrier
Speaker:mix." and so to answer your question, any shipper of any size should look at this.
Speaker:The mid-market to enterprise shippers, what does that mean?
Speaker:Well, you're doing over 10,000 transactions a month.
Speaker:Maybe you're even doing hundreds of thousands to millions of shipments a day.
Speaker:You absolutely, table stakes, have to be looking at becoming a savvy multi-carrier
Speaker:that's not just relying on your own instinct and math from someone on your
Speaker:team, but to l- that's leveraging a reliable AI that's able to say, "No, I've,
Speaker:I've looked at billions of historical deliveries across all these carriers.
Speaker:I can tell you you exactly need to be using X, Y, Z carriers and A, B, C
Speaker:service levels for these exact type of packages." That's the, the shippers that
Speaker:are looking like rock stars within their company, the logistics and supply chain
Speaker:professionals that are, you know, getting promotions and looking like rock stars in
Speaker:their company, they're using the latest tools to have the ultimate shipping
Speaker:operation, the ultimate carrier mix.
Speaker:They're also realizing no matter how fancy of a brand they are, they
Speaker:don't have leverage at the table to only use one carrier and have
Speaker:it go swimmingly well during peak.
Speaker:They're realizing, "If I'm gonna avoid peak volume constraints, if I'm
Speaker:gonna avoid a huge, you know, downtime situation and making all my consumers
Speaker:happy and getting packages quick, I can't be overly reliant on one player."
Speaker:Even if you love them, even if they've been awesome, it's no
Speaker:longer the way the world works.
Speaker:Everyone needs a helping hand.
Speaker:Everyone needs a backup.
Speaker:You gotta go multi-carrier.
Speaker:I do wanna ask here, I mean, let's talk timing.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:So let's say somebody's listening, it's September.
Speaker:Maybe they didn't even see this till October.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:Adding carriers during peak.
Speaker:Do it?
Speaker:Don't do it?
Speaker:Risky?
Speaker:Not risky?
Speaker:You know, what do you see the other shippers do and don't do?
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:This is why we released EasyPost Wallet, right?
Speaker:The fastest way to get up and running during peak season, or hopefully right
Speaker:before peak season, you're prepared-
Speaker:I was gonna say, we, we still are advocates of
Speaker:preparing Yeah in advance, but
Speaker:… Through EasyPost Wallet, it could be a matter of clicks.
Speaker:Depending on the carrier and service level, it could be a matter
Speaker:of minutes, where you feel like you're practically up and running.
Speaker:You have the right rates in place.
Speaker:You're ready to go.
Speaker:Just fund your Wallet.
Speaker:Now, every shipper is different, and every carrier is different, so there
Speaker:may be certain shippers who wanna work with certain Wallet carriers, and it's
Speaker:gonna take a bit of time, a few days.
Speaker:What we can say is it's going to be the fastest, most seamless experience
Speaker:through Wallet versus if you went direct to them at this time of the year.
Speaker:We're right on the brink of going into the fall.
Speaker:Most shippers look and say, "The, the boat passed.
Speaker:I don't have time to even think about my carrier mix.
Speaker:I'm too late.
Speaker:Dang.
Speaker:I'm about to lose a ton of money this holiday season.
Speaker:I can tell." Like, don't get into that negative thought cycle.
Speaker:You do have time.
Speaker:We even have sizable brands, you'd be surprised, really large retailers that
Speaker:are switching over to GOFO, Union, Veho as we speak, and they're confidently
Speaker:doing that as they know they'll be up and running and ready to go through EasyPost.
Speaker:Yeah, I think it's so important with flexibility, with being resilient, is
Speaker:that ability to kind of switch and not lock yourself in and say, "Well, it's
Speaker:now September. It's now October. I am not gonna make any changes." there,
Speaker:there are ways to do it, and, and I o- absolutely recommend always when you're
Speaker:adding a carrier, obviously you're not gonna shift all your volume to it.
Speaker:You know, do some little testing, and start it out with a lane or two.
Speaker:Start it out with 10%.
Speaker:Do, do something small and, and get those testing going.
Speaker:That's kind of that that backup contingency plan that we
Speaker:sort of talk about in general.
Speaker:It never hurts.
Speaker:You can start it at any time and kind of see where you're at.
Speaker:So I totally am on board with doing a little testing, even throughout peak.
Speaker:That, that's part of the kind of resilience we have.
Speaker:Well, Joe, this has been so fun.
Speaker:I love talking about carriers.
Speaker:I love helping shippers find the right carrier for your specific needs because
Speaker:it is completely different, you know?
Speaker:And there are times when it's gonna be one of those big carriers is
Speaker:perfect, and there are times when it's gonna be one of these other
Speaker:exciting, new, innovative carriers.
Speaker:It, it's that mix that really is the future.
Speaker:So Joe, if there was something, one takeaway, one thing you
Speaker:want our shippers to remember from today, what would that be?
Speaker:Reevaluate what carriers you're using during the most
Speaker:important time of the year.
Speaker:It's, it's now.
Speaker:Now is the time you need to evaluate.
Speaker:This'll be your last shot before you go into the next few months, and
Speaker:then you look in January, February, March at how much money did I
Speaker:actually take home in my pocket after all those awesome holiday sales?
Speaker:Now is the time to evaluate the precise carrier mix you can put in place to get
Speaker:the best time, the best time in transit, to get the best rates, to get the best
Speaker:support, to have fewer surcharges.
Speaker:It's gonna be within within the fall here that you wanna do that.
Speaker:And EasyPost is gonna be the way that you get up and running fast as you
Speaker:make those decisions specifically through our, our Wallet program.
Speaker:So-
Speaker:I love it.
Speaker:I'm, I'm gonna challenge you.
Speaker:Put a time on your calendar right now.
Speaker:I want you to message me on LinkedIn.
Speaker:I want you to message me somewhere.
Speaker:Tell me you've put a little time on your calendar to kind of review your
Speaker:carriers, look at your carrier mix, look at, at Wallet, especially if
Speaker:you're already an EasyPost customer.
Speaker:Check out those new carriers that we've got there in Wallet.
Speaker:Just take a, a little bit of time and, and do… Just putting it on
Speaker:your calendar's gonna make you feel so much better, and you're gonna
Speaker:perform so much better, as you said.
Speaker:And I hope that we all get massive raises, massive shout-outs come January,
Speaker:because you were so successful in the way you you set up your carrier mix.
Speaker:Joe, thanks so much for being here.
Speaker:This was awesome.
Speaker:I'm sure we'll have you again soon to hear about new, exciting things in the,
Speaker:in the product land here at EasyPost.
Speaker:It's been fantastic.
Speaker:No, thanks, Lori.
Speaker:It was fun.
Speaker:We'll see you all next time.
