The same-day delivery model gets new life

When the highest-profile same-day delivery service—Kozmo.com—crashed in April, it seemed to take the same-day delivery idea with it.

But now the idea has come alive again. Ensenda Inc. launched this month in San Francisco but with national ambitions. Its model: fulfill customers’ orders from the stock on retailers’ shelves and deliver it using local courier services in as little as 60 minutes.

Much like the DNet delivery service in San Francisco--where the founders of Ensenda worked--that closed last year after investors, who had put in $1 million, decided it couldn’t make a go of it, Ensenda plans to contract with couriers in local markets who will pick up at the store and deliver to the customer. It says it has agreements with couriers in 75 markets representing 7,600 delivery personnel. It plans to be in 100 markets by year’s end.

“Ensenda’s goal is to satisfy the pent-up demand for immediate delivery,” says CEO and co-founder Chris Mannella, a former Webvan Group executive. “When buyers fill their shopping carts, they want their purchases right away. With the Ensenda service, merchants can capture impulse buyers, improve customer service to win repeat buyers, and become more competitive in the process.”

Ensenda’s first customer is Kepler’s Books based in Silicon Valley. Customers whose orders exceed $50 get free delivery. Kepler’s says web-based sales increased 12% and the average order 4% when it implemented the Ensenda service.

Ensenda’s founders are Chris Mannella and Rob Howard, vice president of business development, whose background is in the courier industry and Internet retailing.

Chris Moore, former president of DNet, says Ensenda stands a good chance of success in this new business climate. "We had a black cloud hanging over DNet that had more to do with market timing than with the business model," Moore says. "As long as Ensenda keeps their expense rate very modest until they get market validation of their business plan they`ll do fine."

Moore says he still believes in the quick delivery model as Ensenda is pursuing it. "I continue to believe that leveraging the local infrastructure to get rapid delivery from store inventory makes great sense," he says.