Founder Matt Chasen’s moving frustration inspired profitable and growing global transport marketplace.
Austin, TX (PRWEB) December 3, 2009 — uShip, the global online shipping marketplace, today announced it has surpassed $125M in business transacted in just five years, two-thirds of which has occurred during the recession. In 2009, uShip’s revenues doubled versus 2008 and the company also enhanced local settings for customers in the UK, EU, Canada, and Australia. uShip turned profitable in 2008, and at the 2010 SXSW Interactive conference, this will be a topic of discussion.
Inspiration from Frustration = Business Gold
In 2002, Matt Chasen sat frustrated in the back of a nearly-empty 20-foot moving truck in Seattle. The 9-foot rental van he ordered was sold out, meaning he was about to drive his relatively small set of belongings in a virtually empty truck all the way to Texas.
Then lightning struck. Chasen imagined filling the extra space with people’s items headed in the same direction. But how could he find them? His inspiration (and question) would eventually become uShip.
Launched in 2004, Chasen is now CEO of the 50-person company, which has stayed true to his original vision: connect people with transporters to make shipping more efficient and affordable. Feedback-rated transport companies, often with excess capacity or already making a similar trip, place competing bids to win business and ship customers’ cars, freight, household goods, horses, boats, pets, heavy equipment and more. As a transactional business model, uShip earns a fee from every completed shipment on its marketplace.
“Moving hard-to-ship things like cars, boats, households, equipment and freight is typically the source of frustration, not inspiration,” said Chasen. “I was fortunate to recognize that eureka moment over seven years ago, but, in some ways, we feel we’re just getting started with an increasing number of opportunities to grow and diversify uShip.”
uShip Marketplace Growth
* Over $125M in business has transacted on uShip since 2004
* Two-thirds (about $82M) of uShip’s transaction volume has occurred during the recession
* uShip’s revenues doubled in 2009 vs. 2008
* eBay item shipments on uShip have topped $30 million
Global Growth
* Launched international support and non-U.S. shipments in 2005, and today uShip transport jobs have gone into and out of nearly 100 countries and regions
* Compared to 2008, non-U.S. shipments are up 500 percent globally and 272 percent in the UK
* In 2010, uShip projects continued in-country support for Western Europe and other countries.
Customer Growth
* 900,000 shipments have been listed on uShip since launching in 2004
* Over 26,000 customer stories have been left on uShip, thousands more on Facebook
* At any given time, $8-$10 million in shipping jobs are available to transporters on uShip
Transporter Growth
* 160,000 transporters have registered and placed 2.8 million bids on uShip.com
* Transporters on uShip have traveled 185 million miles, equal to 755 trips to the moon
* Transporters volunteering for Highway-to-Help, uShip’s charitable moving program that provides shipping services to those in need at little or no cost, have helped hundreds of people and traveled 200,000 miles, equal to eight times around the world
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