Electronic Commerce and Rapid Delivery: The Missing Logistical Link

In the span of just a few short years, the World Wide Web (WWW) has emerged from the laboratories of computer scientists into the homes of millions of ordinary people. A recent CommerceNet/Nielsen Media Research Survey (http://www. commerce.net/news/press/121197.html 12/11/97), estimated that 58 million adults now use the Internet in the U.S. and Canada and an estimated 48 million people use the Web. However, it is estimated that only 10 million people (16 years of age or older) have actually made a purchase on the WWW. While there appears to be a significant trend in the growth of electronic commerce (or simply, EC), the lack of transaction and personal security, consumer uncertainty about quality of goods of services bought over the Internet, consumer inertia in general, lack of knowledge, and the often poor performance of the WWW are frequently cited as reasons why people do not shop on the Web. The authors believe that for the present and for some time into the future, a major source of customer dissatisfaction will stem from EC’s inability to deliver tangible products and services quickly and inexpensively. Consumers will come to expect not just “Next Day” deliveries, but also “Same Day” deliveries for a wide array of products in the same way that they expect to be able to make real time airline, hotel and automobile reservations today