Overnite Express Case

Case Study 2

Overnite Express

Nowadays people tend to think that successful entrepreneurs do not make any mistakes due to their incredible flair.  In fact, success is commonly based on overcoming multiple failures rather than on innate talent. For instance, Rob Ukropina, an alumni of the University of Southern California, had an impressive path to the entrepreneur’s success.

After graduation, he demonstrated an example of excellent career development. Ukropina has built the career in the financial printer industry from a salesman in Welsh Graphics to a division president in Pandick Printing during seven years. Moreover, he did not only perform his best but also laid the foundation of his network of law firms he had provided printing services to.

Despite outstanding managing of the Orange County division for six years, Rob decided to start his own leasing company and reinvest all the money he made into this venture. Unfortunately, economic recession and non-supportive partner caused the Ukropina’s biggest failure and, moreover, his wife even had to return to work to satisfy the family’s basic needs like food and clothing.

Although times got tough, Rob, as a genuine entrepreneur, kept pushing forward and exploring opportunities. Finally, after analysis of his previous job’s distribution costs, he realized that setting up the delivery service company, which is focusing on service excellence and customer satisfaction in a specific region rather than providing services nationwide, would be an opportunity. Thus, Overnite Express has been founded.

The first customers Ukropina obtained were the law firms from his network. In this case, Rob demonstrated applying of entrepreneurial critical dimensions, namely concept of control over resources and concept of management. Indeed, due to his maintenance of good relationships with past clients, Overnite Express not only got its first customers but also spent minimum costs on that. He used the trust he gained as the salesman and the manager and promised an outstanding shipping services in Southern California. After many client complaints regarding the small operating area, the company started working in the entire state of California.

As companies like UPS and FedEx dominated in the industry, Ukropina decided to gain competitive advantage over them by applying Porter’s Differentiation Focus Strategy. This generic strategy concentrates on a niche market and developing unique differentiated services for this specific market. Therefore, Overnite Express started offering higher quality services for reasonable price in Southern California first and then in the entire California. The main goal of such strategy is to monopolize the segment and consequently make it unattractive to existed and potential competitors.

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