MBE Worldwide S.p.A. ("MBE"), is a third-party provider of shipping, fulfillment, print and marketing via a network of franchised locations. MBE is a family-owned Italian holding company based in

Milan, Italy Milan ( , , Lombard language, Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the List of cities in Italy, second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 ...

. It is one of the world's largest networks of Service Centers offering shipping, logistics, printing, marketing and design to business and private customers.

History

Mail Boxes Etc. (MBE) was founded in the United States in 1980 by Gerald Aul, Pat Senn and Robert Diais. By 2000, MBE had expanded to 4,000 locations including Korea and Sweden. MBE is a network of retail centers offering pack and ship,

logistics Logistics is generally the detailed organization and implementation of a complex operation. In a general business sense, logistics manages the flow of goods between the point of origin and the point of consumption to meet the requirements of ...

, communications and marketing services to business and private customers. Mail Boxes Etc

On December 31, 2016, MBE Worldwide had almost 1,600 locations in 30 countries, with aggregated sales of €427 million in 2016.

Acquired by UPS

In 2001,

UPS UPS or ups may refer to: Companies and organizations * United Parcel Service, an American shipping company ** The UPS Store, UPS subsidiary ** UPS Airlines, UPS subsidiary * Underground Press Syndicate, later ''Alternative Press Syndicate'' or ...

acquired Mail Boxes Etc., Inc. locations in the United States and Canada. On April 7, 2003, UPS began converting the 3,000 Mail Boxes Etc. locations in the United States and Canada (at the time, nearly 90% of the domestic U.S. network) to

The UPS Store The UPS Store (formerly Mail Boxes Etc.) is a subsidiary of United Parcel Service which provides, according to its website, shipping, shredding, printing, fax, passport photos, personal and business mailboxes, and notary services. Histor ...

and began offering lower (around 20% on average) UPS direct shipping rates. The centers remain locally owned and operated, and continue to offer a variety of packing, shipping, freight, postal, printing and business services.

MBE Worldwide Group

In 2009, MBE Worldwide was formed to acquire the existing Mail Boxes Etc. network from UPS across the world except the United States and Canada. MBE Worldwide began to expand across western Europe, establishing a direct presence in France in 2012, Poland in 2014, and in the UK and Republic of Ireland in 2021.

Acquisitions

In 2017, MBE Worldwide acquired two US companies,

PostNet POSTNET (Postal Numeric Encoding Technique) is a barcode symbology used by the United States Postal Service to assist in directing mail. The ZIP Code or ZIP+4 code is encoded in half- and full-height bars. Most often, the delivery point is add ...

International Franchise and

AlphaGraphics AlphaGraphics is a franchised chain of more than 270 independently owned and operated marketing service providers with full-service print shops. AlphaGraphics business centers are franchised by AlphaGraphics, Inc., part of the MBE Worldwide ...

Inc. With these acquisitions, the MBE network now reaches around 2,500 service centers, including 500 in the US and 2,000 in 43 countries around the world. In 2021, MBE Worldwide acquired Pack & Send, a leading brand in Australia, New Zealand and UK in the Shipping and Logistics service industry, and MultiCopy, a leading brand in the Netherlands that provides Print and Marketing Solutions from sign, print and websites. In addition,

Prestashop PrestaShop is a freemium, open source e-commerce platform. The software is published under the Open Software License (OSL). It is written in the PHP programming language with support for the MySQL database management system. It has a software d ...

joined the MBE Worldwide group in November 2021, propelling MBE Worldwide towrds becoming a fully integrated digital and physical commerce platform for business growth. MBE Worldwide acquired leading e-commerce platform In 2022, MBE Worldwide purchased a majority stake in the UK company World Options Ltd. and an Italian tech platform dedicated to proximity logistics, GEL Proximity.

References

{{Reflist, colwidth=30em Logistics companies of Italy Companies based in Milan Retail companies established in 1980 Transport companies established in 1980 United Parcel Service 2001 mergers and acquisitions