April 09, 2013

OnTrac?

Ever hear of OnTrac?

Newegg is using them to deliver my most recent order. I have no idea who they are, or what they do, but they seem to be trying to set themselves up as an alternative to UPS and Fedex, and good luck to them. It ain't gonna be easy to compete in that market.

They have the same kind of online order tracking as the other two, which isn't cheap, but is appreciated. As they often do, Newegg split my order into three parts and shipped them from three different facilities. Two are coming up from California, via OnTrac, supposedly to deliver tomorrow some time.

The other one is coming from Louisville, via UPS, also delivering tomorrow. I wonder who will show up first? (That suggests to me that OnTrac doesn't have full national coverage yet.)

UPDATE:

OnTrac is the leader in regional overnight package delivery service within California, Arizona, Nevada, Oregon, Washington, Utah, Colorado and Idaho.

No mention of Kentucky there, which explains UPS doing the third one.

UPDATE: I tell you; it's gonna be hard for me to come up with stuff to blog about this season. Nothing fresh about anime until the first episode of Railgun shows up this weekend.

I suppose I could do another Fairy Tail cheesecake post.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste in Daily Life at 12:50 PM | Comments (10) | Add Comment
Post contains 217 words, total size 1 kb.

1 Yeah, I actually watched some new shows Sunday.  Was that ever a mistake!

Posted by: ubu at April 09, 2013 02:03 PM (SlLGE)

2 About two years ago, Amazon started delivering orders to me via OnTrac, and the percentage I receive that way has been steadily going up ever since.  The only difference I notice between UPS and OnTrac is what time of day they deliver.  I'd never heard of them before Amazon started using them, and their delivery is via a small van instead of a big truck, but if Amazon and NewEgg are using them extensively, they can't be that small an operation.

Posted by: David at April 09, 2013 02:31 PM (qw+UI)

3

I bet initially they were California-only, and have been expanding slowly North and East.

Seems like a very rational business plan, except that doing it in the middle of the Great Recession wasn't the best timing.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at April 09, 2013 03:04 PM (+rSRq)

4 ...doing it in the middle of the Great Recession wasn't the best timing.

If they're doing it DESPITE the Great Recession, that's pretty darn impressive.

I work with a number of shippers at the Duck U Bookstore: UPS, FedEx, DHL, YellowFreight, UPS Freight, USPS, on and on... and I've never once heard of OnTrac. 

Posted by: Wonderduck at April 09, 2013 03:18 PM (9jITs)

5  According to their website they don't operate in Illinois.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at April 09, 2013 03:35 PM (+rSRq)

6 Apparently they got started in 1991 as "California Overnight", mostly doing business and legal documents. I have vague memories of seeing their vans in the Nineties, but the first time I heard of OnTrac was January, 2010, when Amazon started sending some of my packages through them.

-j

Posted by: J Greely at April 09, 2013 04:11 PM (fpXGN)

7

Expanding north to Oregon and Washington was certainly a smart thing, because it opens up Amazon as a potential customer.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at April 09, 2013 04:14 PM (+rSRq)

8 I have three deliveries scheduled for today: UPS, Safeway, and OnTrac. OnTrac was first, at 10:45. So points for them.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at April 10, 2013 12:11 PM (+rSRq)

9 Safeway showed up about 1:00. I'm still waiting for UPS.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at April 10, 2013 03:01 PM (+rSRq)

10 Ah, I read the notification wrong. UPS shows up tomorrow.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at April 10, 2013 05:05 PM (+rSRq)

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