Shutl secures investment ahead of US launch

The delivery firm has raised the investment from technology specialists Notion Capital and E Ventures. The move bolsters a $2m investment earlier this year from other shareholders including UPS Strategic Enterprise Fund and Hummingbird Ventures.

Shutl, which works by aggregating the capacity of local same-day couriers into a web-based platform which is integrated with retailers’ ecommerce platforms, will first offer its services to two unnamed consumer electronics and department store retailers in New York and San Francisco in early 2013.  

The service will then be rolled out to Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, Philadelphia, Washington, Montreal and Toronto.

The delivery specialist works with retailers including Argos, Maplin, Laithwaites and Oasis-owner Aurora in the UK.

Shutl’s service allows online purchases to be delivered shortly after purchase or in a one hour window of the shoppers choice.

Shutl chief executive Tom Allason said that Amazon and Walmart’s moves to offer same day delivery in the US had sped up the process of launching in the US.

Allason told Retail Week: “It makes sense for us to get moving in the US and we are very pleased to have secured the funding after receiving a lot of interest in investment.

“The 12 cities we are launching in have a population of 90 million people. In the UK we can reach 45 million people across 50 towns so there’s a lot of scope for growth.”

Allason said that the partnership with global business E Ventures would allow Shutl to look at new markets including Japan, South Korea and Singapore.