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Aprisa Express

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“We’re honored to partner with the Smithsonian National Postal Museum
to explore the history and development of the mail and parcel industry. As a woman-owned business and a proud partner of the USPS, we are happy to tell our story and contribute the small piece of history that we’re creating today. We want to give a special thank you to all of those at the Smithsonian who realize the importance of telling the story.”

Aprisa Express is a premiere shipping and logistics partner for e-commerce, mail, freight, and parcel shipments in Mexico, South America, and other major markets around the globe. In the complexity of international logistics, together with the USPS we’re making the world a smaller place by helping U.S. companies and organizations make deliveries in a simple, smart, and effective way

Leslie Guidry-Foxhoven
CEO, APRISA EXPRESS

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Leslie Guidry-Foxhoven

00:01

Hi, my name is Leslie Foxhoven.

00:03

I'm the president and founder of Aprisa Express.

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Most importantly, we are honored to partner with the Smithsonian National Postal Museum

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to explore the history and the development of the mail and parcel industry.

00:15

As a woman-owned business and a proud partner of the United States Postal Service

00:19

we're delighted to tell our story and contribute the small piece of history that we're creating today.

00:25

Aprisa Express is an international shipping and logistics company specializing in e-commerce,

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mail, parcels, and freight.

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We initiated services in Mexico and then expanded those services into South and Central America

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and then subsequently the rest of the major markets in the world.

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So in the late 1980s, if a US-based company wanted to sell their products overseas or

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go global, it was happening but it didn't come without tremendous challenges.

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So for the next few minutes let's say that your US-based book company and you're desiring

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to go international and sell your books to various countries around the world.

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First challenge is that there was no Internet for you use in order to identify your target markets.

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So at that time, there would have been a company like Aprisa Express who would go out to the

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local market let's say in Santiago Chile, identify local citizens as a target market

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and then take that list back to you.

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You as your book distributor would then prepare your database and do an international mailing

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via US Postal Service to all of that target list, and then a company like Aprisa Express

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would have received the returns and the orders from those individuals and then express that

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shipment in those orders back to you.

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You would then fulfill those orders and using United States Postal Service to ship the shipments

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out into South and Central America.

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Last challenge is that the track and trace at that time of shipments was minimal, shipments

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were held in duty and customs, and duties and taxes were tremendous.

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The bureaucracies there, nobody was held accountable and most of those international shipments

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were abandoned.

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So let's now fast forward to 1995, and the late 1990s.

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We now have the Internet. You're able to offer your books to the whole world.

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Everybody's able to access your Internet website and now they're able to order.

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Your next challenge is, how I'm going to get those shipments overseas, cost effectively,

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without an issue in customs, and hold somebody accountable so that my client can receive

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their book and have a seamless customer experience.

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Well that is certainly not happening at that time frame because there was no way to control

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the issues that were occurring in customs.

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So many books, once again, we're being held, and abandoned, and lost in customs.

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So you as a business owner are losing the product and losing the value of the book and

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your client is typically unhappy because they now didn't have the order they had already paid for.

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So as we fast forward to the 2000s, and up until today, we find many of those issues

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have been resolved and we now have developed as US businesses customer bases around the

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world, still struggling a bit with the issues and customs.

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So many of the commodities arrive at the final destination and held in customs and abandoned.

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So Aprisa has established a new duty and tax calculator.

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So the way forward is that you're the same book salesmen today.

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You now have your target list, people are going to your site to buy your books and now

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you are able to say, click here.

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And you can now find the total price, it includes your duty and tax, and guess what?

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It's in your local currency.

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So your customers are able to buy right there at that exact moment and in most cases request

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a service that's one two three days.

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So we are looking today at customer experience that is excellent.

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Customers are receiving their books in one to three days.

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There's no hold up in customs, and you as a publisher or as a book salesmen are no longer

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losing any of your commodities in customs.

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So what does the future hold for e-commerce?

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It is so exciting to think about it.

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The world is getting so much smaller every day.

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Whether you're in China, in Shenzhen, or whether you're in Retalhuleu, Guatemala, you are going

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to expect your deliveries to be made just as if your client of a book salesman in

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New York City and you're living in Pasadena, Texas.

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What your customers are now going to expect with the iPhones and all the new apps,

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they're going to be going online, they're going to be on a train, they're going to look for your

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website, place in order, have all the data uploaded and be getting deliveries within

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one to two days regardless of where you're based around the world.

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They'll have multiple solutions to choose from.

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There will be no losses in customs, and all of the deliveries will be seamless.

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And we have absolutely crushed the myth that shipping creates a black hole.

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It doesn't.

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Everyone will be held accountable and the one great things that you'll be able to count

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on the United States Postal Service department and companies like Aprisa to deliver the best,

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seamless solutions for all US-based businesses so we can continue to be the proudest companies

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in the world offering our products to every country.

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We want to give a special thank you to all those at the Smithsonian who realize the importance

05:39

of telling this story on a large scale.

05:41

It's been a blessing to be involved

05:43

and thank you so much.

Over the past 30 years, Leslie has played an integral role in the development of last mile innovation in logistics for private companies and postal administrations. Leslie has served as the postal chairman for the Air Courier Conference of America and is the co-founder of the Latin America Courier Association (CLADEC). She is also a member of the International Mailers Advisory Group (IMAG), and founded and leads a coalition of regional postal administrations and private parcel carriers with the purpose of sharing best practices to promote more trade amongst the public and private sectors. Through her humanitarian organization, ALPHA, she brings together logistics partners to support aid efforts.

The other side of the world isn’t that far away.

Employees posing for a group photograph

The story of Aprisa Express and the United States Postal Service began almost twenty years ago. It all started with a simple idea...

1987
THE STORY BEGINS
A veteran in the international mail and parcel industry, Leslie Guidry-Foxhoven began designing and implementing mail and parcel solutions with postal administrations throughout the Americas region.

1990
RELATIONSHIPS ARE FORMED
Through various private companies and start-up operations, Leslie establishes relationships with more than 25 postal entities throughout the region of Latin America and South America

1996
JOINT VENTURES WITH POSTAL ADMINISTRATIONS
As Country Manager in Mexico, Leslie establishes partnerships with postal entities throughout the Americas. Together they implement processes that in some instances increased on-time delivery to 98% while increasing revenues.

1996
MAIL LATIN AMERICA IS FOUNDED
Based on the established network throughout the region, Leslie founds a wholesale logistics provider offering mail and parcels solutions throughout the Americas. This company experiences continued growth for several years before eventually merging with a worldwide entity

2007
APRISA EXPRESS IS FOUNDED
Based on the success of prior endeavors and the expertise in the region, Leslie and her business partner David M. Smith established Aprisa Express, a woman owned business, as a premier ecommerce and international mail and publications provider servicing the Americas

2008-2009
APRISA DEVELOPS FINANCIAL MAIL & MARKETING SOLUTIONS IN THE AMERICAS
THE PROBLEM WAS that mail sent from U.S. companies to the Americas was inefficient once it arrived at the destination post office. Unless companies paid a high premium, there were no options to make mail trackable, or even to know if addresses they were sending mail to existed at all! This prevented many companies in the U.S. from marketing or developing relationships with financial customers in these regions.

THE APRISA SOLUTION was to work with postal administrations and private partners throughout the Americas to implement trackable financial mail deliveries, customs brokerage and clearance and final mile deliveries. Core services included delivery confirmation, track and trace, and address hygiene, and return mail management programs. This allowed U.S. businesses to go global and engage customers in the Americas with confidence.

2009-2010
APRISA DEVELOPS P.O. BOX SOLUTIONS FOR INTERNATIONAL E-COMMERCE CUSTOMERS
THE PROBLEM WAS when international customers purchased products from U.S. companies, they only had two shipping options: expensive but guaranteed or cheap but non-trackable. This problem stifled international e-commerce because some consumers couldn’t pay the high shipping costs.

THE APRISA SOLUTION was to offer a third option. Via a partnership with Kardel Enterprises, Aprisa operated domestic addresses that allowed customers to receive purchased goods even if the retailer did not ship internationally. The orders are received via the USPS domestically and shipped to the destination as required. In the end, this created a surge in U.S based e-commerce sales with increased buyer confidence.

2013-2014
APRISA BECOMES AN OFFICIAL GDE® PARTNER OF THE USPS AND HELPS U.S. SHOPPERS MAKE PURCHASES ABROAD
THE PROBLEM WAS that U.S. consumers faced high shipping costs when buying products from companies overseas. Most consumers were forced to pay high premiums for reliable shipping, or be faced with a much slower, unreliable shipping option that could take weeks.

THE APRISA SOLUTION was to partner with the USPS under their Global Direct Entry program to offer consumers an inexpensive shipping option that could still be fast. Under this program, all shipping is handled by Aprisa until it passes through U.S. Customs. Once cleared, it is delivered to the USPS and then delivered reliably to its final destination. This model of international shipping reduces costs to U.S. consumers and is faster than anything else at a comparable price

2015 & BEYOND
APRISA CONTINUES TO IMPROVE INTERNATIONAL SHIPPING FOR U.S. COMPANIES & CITIZENS
APRISA EXPRESS is always tackling new challenges in international shipping. Our most recent service, Parcelmax® has proven to be a truly innovative solution to one of the industry’s biggest challenges to date: customs, duties and taxes. When products ship from the U.S. to international customers, they go through customs and are usually subject to import duties and taxes. In the old model, customers would sometimes not be aware of these costs and couldn’t pay. Hundreds and thousands of products were abandoned in customs over the years. Aprisa has changed that with Parcelmax®, which allows international customers to pay all duties and taxes in their local currency when they checkout online. This means products sail right through customs, making for a faster delivery and offering full visibility to the shopper and e-tailer. And we’re only getting started!

That’s all for now, but we hope you follow the story as we partner with the USPS to write the next chapter.

America’s Mailing Industry