The global courier market has evolved beyond apprehension in the last 10 years to meet the ever-growing customer demands. In the past, postal companies were the only courier entity that was tackling deliveries nationally, and only rarely internationally. Due to the globalization of markets and the upheaval of international competition between companies, we saw many industries like logistics adapt dramatically to the rising consumer needs. This led to the emergence of a whole new market figure- Courier, Express and Parcel (CEP) – shaping a different future for the logistics industry.
What we know for sure is that the transportation of industrial and consumer goods to more locations, at a faster speed made the CEP market the new major player in logistics.
How is CEP different than traditional postal services?
Most of you have used traditional postal services at least once in your lifetime for transporting items for personal or business use. The truth is that postal orders used to be better than courier services because of the longer distances over which consignments could be shipped. On the other hand, couriers were mainly used for delivering mail, packages, and messages quickly within-country borders. Over time these two solutions merged to give rise to the CEP industry, which is currently dominating the logistics market stage, setting new trends and establishing intelligent planning algorithms across the board.
What does CEP mean in terms of deliveries?
Even though the CEP is difficult to break down into clear sub-segments- Courier, Express and Parcel services have different objectives and modes of operation. Parcel services in logistics are usually looking after the shipments of non-palletized items, which weigh less than 110lb. (50kg), while express shipments are focusing on the time-bound function of their deliveries. Both of these terms exist under the umbrella of the CEP as a faster and overall more reliable courier services package.
How CEP become more customer-focused?
CEP started branching out as a new market that was initially servicing the business sector with urgent orders or ones requiring more expertise (perishable goods, fragile goods, time-sensitive deliveries, etc.). Over time this trend was taken over by a more customer-focused approach, aiming at distributing lower volume orders to individuals, rather than businesses. CEP companies were hired by other wholesale or retail businesses to deliver goods to their customers more efficiently than organizing their transportation in-house by themselves.
Revolution in courier services
The big change in the logistics scene was truly driven by E-commerce and the rising demand by businesses, looking to outsource their small package deliveries from third-party solutions. This created a lot of opportunities and a lot of new challenges for the CEP service providers in no time. Last-mile delivery has become a hot topic that is headlining many discussions in logistics and it’s constantly pushing the frontiers for innovation in delivery technologies.
What does the future hold for the CEP industry?
Zendfast is a courier services provider representing the CEP courier industry, which focuses on providing better speed and reliability. Delivering to businesses- requiring higher shipment loads, and individual customers, who are typically harder to reach, presents a real challenge to all CEP logistics companies.
We think that the only way forward for courier service providers is to embrace new technology and IT innovation wholeheartedly! The future for CEP companies is predicted to get brighter, promising more customers, expanding markets, and higher delivery loads. This is why intelligent planning solutions will likely become an integral part of every courier service solution in the foreseeable future. We also expect to see more advanced delivery technologies like self-driving cars and drones become commonplace if the CEP market continues to grow as predicted.
Providing courier services has always been a tricky business due to the time-dependent function of shipments over long distances. Today, the market is being led by courier solutions like Zendfast that can offer faster and more reliable services than ever before.
Our main prediction for the future of the logistics industry is that there will be an ever-growing demand, and hopefully, more advanced innovation, to cater to everyone’s business or personal shipment needs!