The rate card doesn't tell the whole story. Here's what Nespresso, ColdTrack, and leading enterprise shippers know about choosing last-mile carriers that protect and grow your brand.
For years, carrier selection was a procurement exercise. You compared rate cards, checked on-time delivery statistics, and awarded the business to whoever came in cheapest at scale. It was clean, predictable, and—according to logistics leaders at some of the world's most demanding brands—fundamentally broken.
At Home Delivery World, Jitsu CEO Adam Bryant sat down with Matt Greenspan, Director of Logistics and Transportation at Nespresso, and Warner Siebert, Chief Revenue Officer of ColdTrack, to challenge that thinking. What emerged was a blueprint for how enterprise brands can use last-mile delivery as a competitive differentiator and a driver of customer lifetime value.
The traditional carrier evaluation model (cost vs. on-time delivery) misses an entire category of expenses. Greenspan calls it "the part that doesn't show up anywhere obvious."
Save a dollar per package today, and it sounds like a win. But when that decision leads to more missed promises, more lost or damaged shipments, more customer service calls, and worst of all, customers who don't come back and post damaging, negative online reviews, the math falls apart quickly.
For temperature-sensitive shippers, the stakes are even more immediate. Siebert's data is stark: a single thawed delivery can increase customer churn risk by 30%. Two consecutive thawed deliveries pushes that figure to nearly 90%.
"Everyone focuses on the rate card," Siebert said. "But it's only half the equation. If you can save 30% on shipping costs but one in ten packages doesn't arrive on time or intact, you effectively get what you pay for."
The real cost of a carrier includes customer lifetime value impact, brand equity erosion, and the operational overhead of managing exceptions. The shippers winning on customer experience are the ones who've built that full picture into their evaluation models.
Five years ago, Nespresso ran a largely single-carrier network. Today, their approach to carrier selection starts with the customer experience and works backward, asking not just "how do we move packages efficiently?" but "what delivery experience reinforces our brand?"
The shift matters operationally, too. A single-carrier network might appear to be simpler to manage at scale, but it also concentrates risk. When a labor dispute, system outage, or capacity crunch hits your sole carrier, you're not just dealing with a logistics problem, you're breaking a promise to your customer.
Regional carriers are where the calculus changes. By layering regionals into a multi-carrier strategy, shippers have reported 10–20% increases in one- and two-day transit coverage, with better reliability and lower cost on those lanes. It's what Seibert calls the "sweet spot": faster, more reliable, and cheaper delivery in markets where regionals operate.
At the simplest level, Greenspan defines it this way: a vendor moves packages. A strategic partner helps you deliver your brand.
The difference shows up in the day-to-day, but it's most visible when things go wrong or when you need to build something new. Greenspan shared a concrete example: Nespresso came to Jitsu with an idea for a recycling pickup program. From concept to pilot to nine live markets, the initiative launched in just a few months.
"That kind of speed doesn't typically happen with a typical vendor relationship," Greenspan said. "We came to Jitsu with an idea, explained why it mattered, and they built it with us."
The program has driven measurable customer behavior change: more engagement, higher loyalty, and increased consumption among enrolled customers—outcomes that would never appear in a standard carrier performance report.
For Siebert, the partnership distinction shows up in how carriers handle the hard moments: service disruptions, peak planning, and claims.
"Taking ownership and accountability really comes out when things go sideways," he said. "Being able to actually have a plan of attack, not just a blanket email about holiday hours—that's the difference."
Both Greenspan and Siebert use a clear lens when evaluating carrier partners: do their operating values mirror our brand values?
For ColdTrack, that means carriers who demonstrate ownership, urgency, and an entrepreneurial mindset. For Nespresso, it's partners who show up in day-to-day execution the way a premium brand needs to; not just compliant, but genuinely aligned.
If your organization is still running a single-carrier network, Greenspan's advice is simple: ask yourself why. The comfort of established relationships and consolidated volume discounts often masks real exposure—in resilience, customer experience, and growth ceiling.
The playbook for getting started doesn't require a full network overhaul. Pick one region or one customer segment. Run a pilot. Measure not just cost and on-time performance, but customer satisfaction, loyalty signals, and brand impact. Let the data make the case internally.
For shippers worried about losing tier status with major national carriers, Siebert points out that intermediaries like ColdTrack already aggregate volume across the regional network, meaning shippers can access regional capacity without starting from zero.
The longer-term arc, both speakers agreed, points in one direction. "It's going to be less about regional versus national," Greenspan said, "and more about partner versus vendor. The carriers who stay agile, who are collaborative, and who think about your end customer are the ones who will win."
Last-mile delivery is no longer a back-office function. It is, for many customers, the only physical touchpoint your brand has after the purchase. How that experience goes—whether it reflects your values, whether it's reliable, whether it leaves the customer feeling good—directly shapes whether they come back.
Enterprise shippers who understand this aren't just asking who's cheapest. They're asking who will grow with us, who will build with us, and whose values match ours. That's a fundamentally different question, and it leads to fundamentally different outcomes.
Jitsu covers 130M Americans and works as a true strategic partner, not just another carrier on your rate card. Let's talk about what that looks like for your business.
Reach out to us at getstarted@gojitsu.com to chat with an expert.