The origins of the humble courier can, I suppose, be traced back many hundreds of years to the messengers of old – think men on horseback delivering messages from the King or Pheidippides running a message from the Battle of Marathon to Athens, the fabled “first” marathon.
And so it continued for many years until the advent of and the more widespread ownership of motorised vehicles. From the mid-20th century, the courier industry in the UK initially developed out of the London Taxi trade, with cabbies often being called on to deliver urgent deliveries and letters in the City of London. In the 1970s, motorcycle couriers began to spring up in the city and then since the 1980s, we have seen more and more couriers operating nationwide utilising anything from motorbikes to 7.5t lorries.
Over the last 10 years or so, this trade has developed further and we have seen a proliferation of same day couriers. This seems to have happened purely in response to business demands. Many companies need to use a sameday courier, whether to fulfil an order on time or to ensure the safe and timely delivery of confidential or important documents. These companies are prepared to pay the proportionately higher costs associated with having a dedicated courier to transport their goods in order to ensure that their deadlines are met or that their documents reach their destination without the risk of being lost or confidentiality being breached, determining that the cost to their reputation if an order is not met or if documents were lost would far outweigh the hundred pounds or so it might cost them to get their goods delivered directly from A to B by one driver that is responsible for their load.
And so it is that this humble sameday courier came to be in the industry. As I’m sure the messengers of old felt when running or riding over difficult terrain or through stormy weather, it can be a difficult and frustrating job but once the job is done it can give you such an enormous sense of satisfaction to know that you are helping in one small way to keep the wheels of industry turning!