Over the last decade, the logistics industry has had its fair share of challenges, obstacles, and opportunities – a global pandemic, a variety of geopolitical conflicts, manufacturing shortages and supply chain roadblocks, the rise (and fall) of numerous sales channels and models, and the emergence of advanced ecommerce technology and systems to name a few.
As ShipBob celebrates its 10th anniversary this year, we are excited and humbled at how far we’ve come and how we’ve positioned ourselves for success for the next 10 years, and beyond.
Allow me to look back at some of ShipBob’s achievements, from where we started to the present day, highlighting key initiatives and our guiding pillars that have gotten us to where we are today.
Global expansion
ShipBob began out of my one-bedroom apartment in Chicago. As of June 2024, ShipBob has global offices and a network of over 50 fulfilment centres spanning across 6 countries within North America, Europe, and Australia.
In the last year, ShipBob has introduced facilities in the following locations:
- Our first location in Venray, Netherlands
- Our first location in Western Canada, outside of Vancouver
- Our first location in Mexico, serving Section 321 fulfilment
- 12 new locations in the US and Canada
Pictured above left is the initial ShipBob operations running out of Dhruv’s apartment. Pictured above right is ShipBob’s Moreno Valley fulfilment centre, 10 years later.
A growing number of ecommerce brands are prioritizing cross-border sales. In fact, 36% of brands plan to either ship to new countries or fulfil orders in new countries this year. In order to help brands reach a new audience and seamlessly, we introduced new global capabilities, including:
- Section 321 fulfilment from our Toronto, Canada and Tijuana, Mexico fulfilment centres, allowing brands to reduce costs on import taxes and duties for high-tariff items coming into the US.
- Enhanced Delivered Duties Paid (DDP) shipping options from our US and UK fulfilment centres, with more enhancements and global availability coming soon.
Technology innovations
It’s never been easier to start an ecommerce business. However, it’s harder than ever to keep up with customer expectations and grow efficiently. Our goal at ShipBob is to remove or lower those barriers to scalability.
ShipBob is a leading omnifulfillment partner and fulfilment accelerator that acts as a supply chain “easy button” for brands, enabling them to achieve efficient, seamless order fulfilment and logistics – even allowing many of our brands that are bringing in millions of dollars in revenue each year to maintain a lean operations team of under a handful of people.
This is possible, in part, thanks to our best-in-class technology and continual innovation based on feedback from brands. Over the last year, we’ve introduced new capabilities and enhanced existing features so brands can save time and money.
Some of our key releases included:
- Implementing a Hub and Spoke fulfilment centre model to streamline receiving and fulfilment across our entire US network. We continue to iterate and improve our logistics and are rolling out a program called ShipBob Logistics, which are regional sortation centres that will improve fulfilment speed, cost, and accuracy.
- Partnering with TikTok Shop to power the “Fulfilled by TikTok” logistics solution in the US.
- Improvements to our B2B Suite and EDI capabilities with connectivity to over 100 approved retailers.
- Enhancing the ShipBob Inventory Placement Program (IPP) in the US to make inventory distribution and replenishment as easy and cost-effective as possible.
- Partnerships with Maersk and ECU Worldwide for our end-to-end managed freight and inventory distribution program, FreightBob, allowing brands to unlock more global air and ocean freight lanes.
- Premium customisation features with improved kitting, custom gift notes, and branded packaging capabilities.
- New and improved integrations with NetSuite, Adobe Commerce (formerly Magento), and other leading ecommerce platforms.
- Overall improvement of the ShipBob dashboard and new Product Catalogue to improve usability and cohesion across platforms.
- Direct integrations and partnerships with new couriers and enhancements to ShipBob’s proprietary carrier algorithm logic that allow ShipBob to choose the most cost-effective carrier to meet your delivery promise.
Key C-Suite hires
At ShipBob, we’re proud to attract and retain some of the brightest and most talented employees in the business. We’re particularly excited to welcome the following new members of the leadership team:
- Melissa Nick, ShipBob Chief Supply Chain Officer (former Amazon VP, North America Customer Fulfilment)
- Catherina Lacavera, ShipBob Chief Legal Officer (former Google VP, Legal)
Influential additions to the Board of Directors
We’re also pleased to have added our first independent appointments to our Board of Directors in 2024:
- Adam Dewitt, Board Member (former GrubHub CEO)
- Gail Goodman, Board Member (former Constant Contact CEO)
Awards
We’re honored to be recognised for our fulfilment capabilities by top-tier institutions and publications. In the past year, we’ve been awarded the following accolades:
- 2024 Top Companies by Y Combinator
- Overall Fulfilment Solution of the Year 2024 by the Tech BreakThrough Awards
- The Americas’ Fastest-Growing Companies 2024 by The Financial Times
- America’s Best Startup Employers by Forbes
- 2023 Industry Awards (Fulfilment, Delivery and Logistics) by Direct Commerce UK
- Top Companies by Revenue 2023 by Y Combinator
- Chicago’s 50 Fastest-Growing Companies for 2023 by Crains
Looking ahead
As ShipBob celebrates its 10th anniversary this year, I, along with my co-founder Divey Gulati, and the rest of the ShipBob team, are thrilled to celebrate the resilience, innovation, and dedication that it has taken to achieve what we have to date.
From here, we predict that ecommerce will continue its rapid growth and constant evolution. Today’s consumer craves speed, accuracy, and convenience. It’s up to us to make investments in solutions and products that ensure a quick, seamless post-purchase and delivery experience.
We are excited to continue to advance our mission and support brands and their end customers. As we look forward to the next 10 years and beyond, we are dedicated to advancing our capabilities and continuing to democratize logistics and supply chain capabilities so ecommerce brands can grow and scale with ease.
