ShipBob is an omnichannel global logistics platform, disrupting the ecommerce industry by giving small and medium-sized brands an Amazon Prime-like experience by providing rapid and cost-effective deliveries.
How did you come up with the idea for the company?
Our co-founders Dhruv Saxena and Divey Gulati left India to study engineering in the US and whilst at college decided to launch SnailMail pics, an app that allowed users to quickly send physical pictures to loved ones. As the business expanded they found they spent more time trying to fulfil and deliver orders than on growing the business, a common problem for startups, which inspired the idea for a new company to optimise e-commerce fulfillment for fast growing brands.
Since launching in 2014 the business has undergone tremendous growth. Dhruv and Divey have navigated the tech world and the more traditional warehousing/shipping industry, launching over 30 ShipBob warehouses around the world, all while building a tech platform that gives brands the ability to easily ship orders globally.
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How has the company evolved during the pandemic?
During the pandemic we’ve seen small brands coming into their own to capitalise on the eCommerce surge. With buying moving online and consumers becoming more ecommerce savvy we’ve evolved alongside our customers to fulfil more orders than ever. Across the nutrition sector we saw a 93% increase in shipped orders year-on-year, while sports and fitness was up 71% and toys and games increased by a massive 223%.
The pandemic’s ecommerce surge has meant that the small brands we work with have experienced phenomenal growth and they’ve become even more reliant on our business in order to maintain and expand their operations. Even the newest brand is thinking globally from the outset and we’re there to help them do this, sending their stock around the world to instantly open up new customer markets.
Our tools and analytics give them a single view of all stock and orders, no matter how many fulfilment centres they use across the world, while our live data enables us to flag routes at risk to give brands the choice of best delivery options and ensure their items will arrive at a customer’s door without delay. We’re offering these growing brands the type of shipping infrastructure that used to only be available to enormous retail businesses.
What can we hope to see from ShipBob in the future?
Our main focus will be on building the company’s UK operations to at least 5 ecommerce fulfilment centres in the next 12 months with a site in Poland also launching early 2022. By 2023, the company intends to have 20 fulfilment centres across Europe and create 300 permanent jobs in the UK and another 200 across Europe.
This is part of an ambitious global expansion and alongside Europe we’re growing across Australia, the US and Canada. Ultimately we want to enhance domestic deliveries for brands while also opening up instant access to international customers, as selling overseas is a vital step to helping these brands grow.
