Fred Smith, the chairman, president and CEO of FedEx, the world's largest express delivery company, started a brand-new industry-overnight express delivery, which covers 21/kloc-0 countries around the world, with more than 660 freighters, about 9.5.
10,000 trucks, employs more than 2,654.38+0.5 million employees and independent contractors around the world, and handles 5 million pieces of express mail every day on average. It is one of the top 500 enterprises in the world in 2006, with 5438+0.
Type of enterprise
Express delivery industry.
Growth record
He once proudly said, "We are hellbarons in the computer age." It's true. At the earliest time, they just delivered parcels and letters. Today, they have everything: lobster in Maine, cherries in Japan, flowers in Hawaii, all kinds of medicines, pacemakers, contact lenses, fresh plasma, engines, shock absorbers, European perfume and Swiss watches, and you can deliver anything you can think of. No one has ever done this great cause.
A teenager who loves airplanes.
1August 1944 1 1 day, Fred Smith was born in Max, a suburb of Memphis, USA. His father is a famous local figure, who founded Dick Greyhound Bus Company, Todl Restaurant and other industries by hard work, and Fred is his father's favorite youngest son.
1948, his father who was only 53 years old died of illness. At this time, he is already a rich man, leaving enough property to make future generations worry about food and clothing. However, in order to prevent the younger son from becoming an idle figure relying on his ancestral business in the future, he set up a special foundation for his property in the inheritance technical school. Only when Fred reaches 2 1 year old can he use his own shares.
Although Fred's family is rich, he was born with physical defects. Because of the deformation of his hip bone, he had to wear a carapace and crutches when he was a child. What impressed Fred was his mother, who had been encouraging him. She convinced little Fred that he was like a normal person and built up his self-esteem and self-confidence. In addition to helping her son receive the best treatment, she also asked Fred to try his best to participate in various sports activities within his power. His mother's painstaking efforts were not in vain. In middle school, he not only overcame this congenital disease and physical weakness, but also joined the school basketball team and football team.
Fred has been doing well in school and likes airplanes very much, so he got a driver's license for a private jet when he was 15 years old. 65438-0962 entered the famous Yale University to study economics and political science. But according to Fred himself, he is not an excellent student because he is more interested in social activities. Here, his interest in airplanes was brought into full play, and he signed up for a training course for reserve officers of the Marine Corps. With the deepening of his interest in flying, Smith joined the Yale Flying Club and conducted a series of research on flying. He also worked as an agricultural airplane pilot for a while, hovering over farmland all day.
Since then, airplanes and transportation have become the problems that Fred has been thinking about all his life. When he was a junior in college, he wrote a term paper, questioning that the package could not be transported directly to the destination at that time, but had to be transshipped by several airlines. He suggested that there may be a huge potential market for a company that can directly transport "very important and time-sensitive" goods. But Fred's professor doesn't think so. Although he thinks this paper has some merits, the idea is too imaginative to be realized because of the many controls on air routes by the American government at that time and only a "C" was given when grading.
But what the professor didn't expect was that this idea really succeeded later, because the United States is in a period of technological expansion, the world is moving forward, and the social effect is easier, not more difficult, even though the transformation process is full of hardships, which is necessary for any entrepreneur who doesn't want to repeat others' path.
1966, Fred graduated from Yale University because he was trained as a reserve officer in the university, and then he was recruited into the army, became a member of the Marine Corps and participated in the Vietnam War. The war made Fred mature and tempered him. He came out of the rain of blood and cherished peace even more. Fred said, "I hate destroying and blowing things up, so I decided to do something constructive when I came back."
Interesting paper
1965 A national economics major at Yale University expressed a unique view in his homework: the United States needs its own regular route to deliver parcels. In this 20-page term paper, the air distribution mode based on aviation center is mainly discussed. Smith is fascinated by topology, and this air distribution model is inspired by topology. Topologically, he realized that it would be very efficient to connect all the points in the network through a center, just like a clearing house. Therefore, he pointed out in his paper that because the post office and railway engaged in delivery business at that time rarely sent parcels directly to their destinations, this created a huge market space for express delivery.
However, the professors in the school thought the idea was unique but unrealistic, so they only gave this assignment a C. It was none other than Fred Smith who put forward this bold idea.
1944, Smith was born in a transportation family in Memphis, USA. My grandfather was a captain, and my father built the main system of Greyhound bus in the southern city. Fred learned to fly as a teenager. 1966 When he graduated from Yale University, he planned to study at Harvard Law School. He became a second-class captain in the United States Marine Corps and went to Vietnam twice. Although a bullet once cut the helmet strap tied to his chin, fortunately, he returned to the United States healthily on 1970.
After inheriting $4 million from his father, Smith invested $80 million from venture capital. He registered and established the FedEx Company at 197 1 1973 On April 17, FedEx Company started operation.
Refund in 60 seconds.
Now, every night, the stars are always shining over Memphis, the headquarters of FedEx. They are not real stars, but planes that are about to land. When the clock of FedEx Global Operation Monitoring Center points to 22: 5 1, all departments are ready to pick up the plane, and a race against time is about to begin. At 23: 1 1, the first plane arrived in Memphis. Then the stevedores drove tractors, trucks with hooks and electric cars to the apron to unload the goods. Generally speaking, it only takes 20 minutes to unload the cargo of an airplane.
Trucks transport containers to the sorting hall first, and then classify them according to the size and weight of the goods. The bar code on the consignment note clearly indicates where each package is sent, where it is transported, the flight route and the arrival time. The courier company can know the specific location of each sent goods at any time by reading the bar code on the goods. The transport belt carrying goods is as long as 3 kilometers, like a maze, more like a steel worm entangled in the hall. Packages of various shapes rained down from the slideway onto the conveyor belt. ...
This prosperity is in stark contrast to the difficulty of FedEx's entrepreneurship. In the first trial run, FedEx only delivered seven packages. Losing millions of dollars every month, Smith had to sell his private jet to pay off his debts. Smith was also sued by the bank for fraud.
But Smith firmly believes that success can be achieved. "At that time, I used three different testing methods through three consulting companies, all of which showed that this service was in great demand." Smith recalled. He asked the sales staff to speed up the operation and double the FedEx network. Later, FedEx business began to flourish, which proved Smith's foresight.
FedEx delivers all kinds of goods: fresh lobsters, flowers, fruits, airplane tires, computer parts, toys, plasma and so on. FedEx also accepts bulky goods, such as F- 1 racing cars. In 2000, FedEx transported two giant pandas from Beijing to Washington National Zoo. ...
At that time, the clock pointed to 0: 32, and the intense finishing work began. The sorting arm controlled by computer transports the goods from the big conveyor belt to the small conveyor belt, and then to the sorting area, where the goods are sent out, loaded into containers and transported to the plane. The clock in the global operation monitoring center is already 2: 07 am, at which time all packages and documents must be sorted. Then began to load the plane, by 4: 30, the last plane was loaded, and the intense work day and night came to an end. The next night, it was still a hot scene against time.
In order to cope with the accident, FedEx made multiple preparations. It has its own satellite and the largest weather observation station in America. Every night, two overhead cargo planes shuttle between the east and west coasts to prevent accidents. William Artelay, director of sorting department who has worked in FedEx for 19 years, said: "Our company has made emergency plans for every flight." In FedEx, the express delivery business will not be affected by any unexpected events and accidental factors. The motto of the company is "punctual world". An obvious example is that after "9. 1 1", air transportation was banned nationwide in the United States, but FedEx rented 800 trucks within 12 hours and continued to carry out express delivery business. Therefore, the delivery time of most goods is only one day later than the stipulated time.
FedEx guarantees customers that domestic goods can be delivered overnight, even in the evening, before 10: 30 the next morning. Smith promised: "As long as the delay is 60 seconds, the company will refund."
600 children's planes
FedEx bought planes from bankrupt airlines to expand the transportation scale. His transportation kingdom includes Boeing 727, McDonnell Douglas-10 and McDonnell Douglas-1 1, Airbus A300 and A3 10. After the successful test flight of Airbus A380, FedEx bought 10 aircraft, becoming the first customer to buy this type of aircraft. The secret of Smith's success lies not only in advanced technology, but also in the principle of putting people first.
In Smith's view, without satisfied employees, there will be no satisfied customers, and the company's sustained growth will be out of the question. Company leaders must strengthen communication with employees and win their trust. Even if the company spends a lot of money on hardware equipment, training courses and other projects, if employees are not satisfied with their posts and workplaces, it is difficult to produce good services.
"Staff, service and profit" has become the slogan of the company. "We are an employee-oriented work team; Even if we want the company to become a market leader, develop continuously and make the company's services known to more people, employees will always be the first. We believe that if the company is willing to pay more attention to employees, the services provided by employees will make the company gain more benefits. " Smith said.
In order to strengthen the relationship between employees and the company, Smith decided to name all planes after employees' children. So far, more than 600 planes, FedEx planes, are the names of employees' children.
Due to the success of FedEx, the American government revised the aviation law in the last century and opened the original restrictions on the air transport industry. In the late 1970s, the whole United States began to rely heavily on overnight delivery of FedEx, which was used for everything from urgent business documents to birthday gifts. Merrill Lynch found that its employees used FedEx to transfer documents between different floors of its headquarters because it was faster and safer than internal mail.
Smith is over 60 years old and has no plans to retire. His goal now is to develop the China market. In 2005, Smith Company signed an agreement with Guangzhou Baiyun Airport to build an Asia-Pacific logistics center at Baiyun Airport with an investment of US$ 654.38+RMB 50 million before 2008. Smith proudly commented on FedEx: "We are Hermes in the information age."