PACKAGING TECHNOLOGY AND SCIENCE

Packag. Technol. Sci. 2006; 19: 227–235

Published online 19 April 2006 in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI: 10.1002/pts.726

Measurement and Analysis of the Next-day

Air Shipping Environment for Mid-sized
and Lightweight Packages for DHL, FedEx
and United Parcel Service
By S. Paul Singh,1* Gary J. Burgess,1 Jagjit Singh2 and Matt Kremer1
1
School of Packaging, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA
2
Orfalea School of Business, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, CA, USA

The past decade has shown a great increase in the number of direct to consumer
shipments of products and packages. As a result, parcel delivery companies like
DHL, FedEx, UPS and the USPS have strengthened their presence in air transport.
Using cargo planes, they route packages from various destinations to large airport
hubs, where they sort millions of packages and ship them to their destinations the
next morning. There is a continuous need to quantify what happens to these
packages as they are handled both manually during collection and delivery and on
large high-speed conveying and sortation equipment at hubs. This study measured
and compared shock and drop events for these carriers during next-day and 2-day
shipping service. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Received 5 October 2005; Revised 7 December 2005; Accepted 17 January 2006
KEY WORDS: parcel shipping; air transport; packaging

INTRODUCTION parcels around the world with the same ease,

By definition, the parcel business consists of ship-
ments that are typically small enough to be
handled by one person without aid, but which are
larger than a single letter.1 The steps involved in
parcel movement from origin to destination are
described in Figure 1.
The top four parcel carriers in the USA are DHL,
Federal Express (FedEx), United Parcel Service
(UPS) and USA Postal Service (USPS). These global
delivery services are growing through mergers
and alliances between private express companies,
parcel and freight companies, and leading national
post offices. Using global delivery services, it is
now possible to send all types of documents and
efficiency and reliability that characterize a
good national infrastructure featuring overlapping
postal, express and fast freight services.
A study on the package delivery industry con-
cluded that there are two reasons why the indus-
try has become so important in recent years.1 One
consists of changes in the way goods and services
are produced and distributed in our economy,
globalization, customized mass production, lean
inventory management, rapid customer response
and growth in e-commerce, among others. The
other is the parcel service itself, which is at the van-
guard of transportation service modernization,
with such features as differentiated time-definite
service options, intermodal service, in-transit visi-

* Correspondence to: S. P. Singh, School of Packaging,

Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA.
E-mail: singh@msu.edu

Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Packaging Technology S. P. SINGH ET AL.

and Science
Carrier drop location –
Carrier pick-up location –
drop box, mail store or
mail store or post office
post office

Local pick- Local delivery

Shipper takes parcel to drop

up vehicle vehicle

Receiver picks up parcel

Lines haul
(truck, rail or Line haul
air)
Origin hub
Destination
or terminal
hub

Intermediate
hubs
Local pick-up vehicle
(multiple stops)

Origin – shipper’s Destination – receiver's

premises (consignee’s) premises

Figure 1. Parcel movement from origin to destination.1

bility and data integration with the management Goff3 developed performance requirements that
systems of customers. Thus, parcel service is a were necessary for parcel post packages in 1974.
major element of the transportation infrastructure The study recommended performance-based test
of the nation. It is essential for modern commerce. methods that could be used to reduce physical
Parcel carriers transport over 12% of the value of damage. Singh and Voss4 measured the dynamics
all goods transported, and this represents over 10% of small parcel environment in the UPS ground-
of the US gross domestic product (GDP).2 shipping environment. They used electronic data
A recent survey2 provides evidence of this ten- recorders to capture dynamic events. The findings
dency. As measured by revenue and indexed by of that study are shown in Table 1. These results
the year 1990 as 100, the parcel industry has been suggest that as package sizes increase, drop height
the fastest growing segment of the freight trans- decreases, and also as weight increases, drop
portation industry in the USA for the past several height decreases. The 95% drop level heights in the
decades (Figure 2). table mean that 95% of the drops were below this
Packaged goods are shipped from one place to level.
another using various means of transportation. In another study, Singh and Cheema measured
There has been an increased effort over the past the next-day air environment for UPS and FedEx.5
two decades in measuring the dynamic events that The study tested packages of different sizes and
occur to packages in different transportation weights that were instrumented with drop-height
systems. This data offers useful information to recorders and then shipped through UPS and
design and test packages to potential hazards like FedEx from Lansing, MI, to five different destina-
drops and impacts. The methods used to deter- tions within the USA. The study showed that the
mine these dynamic levels have been well estab- highest drop height measured was 1.97 m and that
lished in previous studies. 95% of all drops were less than 0.43 m. The size of

Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 228 Packag. Technol. Sci. 2006; 19: 227–235
DOI: 10.1002/pts
MEASUREMENT OF NEXT-DAY AIR SHIPPING ENVIRONMENT Packaging Technology
and Science
200

180

160

140

Index (1990=100)
120

100

80

60

40

20

0
1960 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000

Parcel Truck Rail Water Air

Figure 2. Growth of the parcel industry.

Table 1. Drop measurements over five trips from Lansing, MI, to

Monterey, CA
Package size Package Maximum number Highest drop 95% Drop
(cm) weight (kg) of drops height (m) level (m)

31 × 31 × 31 9 11 1.07 0.76
14 10 0.59 0.47
9 17 0.94 0.46
46 × 46 × 41 14 13 1.03 0.61
20 16 0.78 0.66
66 × 51 × 48 14 17 0.76 0.46
20 6 0.48 0.46

the package had no significant effect on the drop
heights associated with medium and larger-sized
packages. However, small-sized and lighter-
weight packages did experience higher drop
heights. This was attributed to the use of auto-
mated handling for larger and heavier packages.
Other studies measured the drop heights for
larger and heavier packages. Singh and Hays6
measured the environment within UPS for pack-
ages weighing 21, 33 and 64 kg. Drop height data
was collected for 48 one-way trips from Lansing,
MI, to three locations within the USA, using UPS
ground shipping mode. The findings of that study
are summarized in Table 2.
The ‘second-day air’ shipping environment was
also measured for small, lightweight packages
moving through FedEx.7 Ten packages were
shipped from Michigan to California and Florida.
Half of the packages had warning labels
(FRAGILE, HANDLE WITH CARE) and the other
half did not. The highest drop height recorded for
packages with warning labels was 1.05 m and the
highest drop height recorded for packages without
warning labels was 1.19 m. The 95% level drop
height was 0.7 m in either case. The effect of label
position on drop orientation has been studied for
large and heavy packages.8 However, there is
presently no data available on mid-sized and light-

Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 229 Packag. Technol. Sci. 2006; 19: 227–235
DOI: 10.1002/pts
Packaging Technology
and Science
Table 2. Drop heights for 48 trips from Michigan to three
locations in the USA
Package weight Package size
(kg) (cm)
21 88 × 50 × 22
33 119 × 76 × 27
64 81 × 59 × 39
weight packages. This study focused on measur-
ing mid-sized and lightweight single parcel envi-
ronment for UPS, FedEx and DHL.
This study had the following objectives:
• To characterize the dynamics of the overnight
and second-day shipping environments for
mid-sized (0.38 m × 0.34 m × 0.34 m) and light-
weight packages (less than 7 kg) shipped by
UPS, FedEx and DHL within the USA.
• To provide recommended test levels for drop
testing packages of this size and weight for the
single parcel shipping environment.
INSTRUMENTATION USED
Data recorders were used to collect dynamic data
that could be used to develop test methods to sim-
ulate the overnight and second-day air environ-
ments. The Environmental Data Recorder–3C
(EDR-3C) manufactured by Instrumented Sensor
Technology (IST), Okemos, MI, USA (9) was
chosen for data collection. The EDR-3C is a
portable, digital sensor/recorder designed to
measure shock in any impact orientation, vibra-
tion, temperature, humidity and pressure in pack-
ages during shipping. Based on previous studies,
the pre-trigger and post-trigger times to be
recorded were set at 50 and 250 ms, respectively.
The sampling rate was 1000 Hz and the trigger
level was 2 × g for all three axes. The test duration
was set at 60 days and the recorder was set to
record with an overwrite limit of 900 events. The
overwrite parameter ensures that the EDR-3C
records the most severe events if the recorder expe-
riences more than 900 events.
Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
S. P. SINGH ET AL.
Highest drop height 95% Drop level
(m) (m)
2.54 0.86
1.32 0.81
0.98 0.56
DROP HEIGHT
MEASUREMENT
Drop heights have been measured using some
very basic principles of physics in the recent years.
One way of measuring free-fall drop heights is by
using the following equation:
h = 1 2 gt 2
where h = drop height, g = acceleration of earth’s
gravity and t = time measured.
This method of measuring drop heights,
however, proves inaccurate in most packaging-
related distribution scenarios. Most bumps and
shocks a package experiences in supply chain are
not free-fall but impacts.
The second popular method for calculating drop
heights involves measuring the slight pressure dif-
ference caused by a fall from one height to another.
This method is also fraught with inaccuracies.
Consider the pressure inside a box when you drop
another box on top of it.
The method used to calculate the drop heights
for this study involved calculating the coefficient
of restitution (e). Packages used during this study
were first calibrated to develop a Package Profile
based on e values. These values were obtained by
dropping the packages (with their contents) from
the same drop heights several times in each orien-
tation: on the faces, on the edges and then on all
the corners. A free-fall drop machine was used for
the drops and the internal recording device (EDR-
3C) recorded each drop. After processing the data
for drop height, the known drop height was pro-
vided to IST’s DynaMax Suite software to create a
package profile. An example of a package profile
is shown in Figure 3 below.
230 Packag. Technol. Sci. 2006; 19: 227–235
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MEASUREMENT OF NEXT-DAY AIR SHIPPING ENVIRONMENT
Figure 3. Package profile using IST’s Dynamax Suite
(source: http://www.isthq.com/)
After receiving the packages back from an actual
shipment, the package profile created for that
package is then used to calculate the drop heights.
TEST PACKAGE SHIPMENTS
Test packages were used to ship the EDR-3C units.
The units were encased in high-density polyethyl-
ene foam cushions inside a two-piece, blow-
moulded, double-walled carrying case with four
metal latches. This carrying case was then placed
in a double-walled corrugated board box. The
entire process of preparing the EDR-3C unit for
shipment is shown in Figure 4. All recorders were
placed in the same orientation in all packages for
every shipment. The corrugated shipping boxes
were sealed using general-purpose plastic box-
sealing tape. All instrumented packages were
0.38 m × 0.34 m × 0.34 m (external dimensions)
and weighed 6.8 kg.
This study was conducted in February–April
2005. The packages were shipped from East
Lansing, MI, to San Luis Obispo, CA. Four round
trips were made for all overnight and second-day
shipments for UPS, FedEx and DHL.
The test packages were picked up from the
School of Packaging at Michigan State University
and loaded in a small delivery vehicle referred to
Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Packaging Technology
and Science
as a ‘package car.’ The packages were taken to their
respective carrier operating centres in the Lansing,
MI, area, where they were consolidated with other
packages and scheduled for overnight and second-
day air delivery. The consignment of packages was
placed into air transport containers, which were
then transported by truck to the regional airport.
The air transport containers were then loaded into
cargo aircraft and transported to the national air
hub. These air hubs serve as the central sorting
facility for most packages from all over the
country.
The air containers were unloaded and trans-
ferred on rollers to the central sorting area, where
employees removed the packages from the con-
tainers, scanned them and sent them on belts to a
central sort area, where sophisticated scanners
tracked and checked the packages’ destination and
size. As packages sped through the hub on a long
network of belts and chutes, diverter arms acti-
vated by the information on the bar code labels dis-
charged packages down chutes and onto proper
sort belts. The packages were then collected,
grouped by destination, and organized based on
whether any special handling was required.
After sorting, the packages were consolidated
with other packages bound for the same destina-
tion. They were then loaded into containers and
onto another ‘feeder’ aircraft to be delivered to the
destination airport facility. After sorting at the local
operating facility, the packages were loaded into
‘package cars’ to be delivered to the final destina-
tion. The packages were then return-shipped to
Lansing, MI, by the carriers and went through a
similar delivery process. The entire round trip took
3–5 days, depending on the type of service. The
data from each EDR-3C for each shipment was
uploaded into a computer, processed and then
imported into a spreadsheet for analysis and
tabulation.
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
Table 3 summarizes the data for both types of ship-
ments (next-day and second-day) for all three car-
riers. The results show that the highest drop height
was 1.77 m. The drop heights are also listed for
90%, 95% and 99% occurrence levels. A drop height
231 Packag. Technol. Sci. 2006; 19: 227–235
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Packaging Technology S. P. SINGH ET AL.

and Science
A B

C D

Figure 4. Preparation of the data recorder packages.

Table 3. Measured drop heights above 76 mm

Next-day Second-day

Drop data DHL FedEx UPS DHL FedEx UPS

Number of drops 184 128 117 168 182 104

Maximum drop height (m) 1.45 1.77 1.23 1.01 0.89 1.63
Drop height at 99% occurrence (m) 1.14 1.04 1.04 0.96 0.88 1.02
Drop height at 95% occurrence (m) 0.86 0.70 0.68 0.76 0.66 0.76
Drop height at 90% occurrence (m) 0.62 0.52 0.46 0.56 0.44 0.48

Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 232 Packag. Technol. Sci. 2006; 19: 227–235
DOI: 10.1002/pts
MEASUREMENT OF NEXT-DAY AIR SHIPPING ENVIRONMENT Packaging Technology
and Science
100%

90%

80%

70%
Cumulative Percentage

60%

50%

40%

30%

20%

10%

0%
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 2

Drop Height (m)

DHL 2nd Day FedEx 2Day UPS 2nd Day

Figure 5. Second-day delivery: percentage of drop heights below a given level.

100%

90%

80%

70%
Cumulative Percentage

60%

50%

40%

30%

20%

10%

0%
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 2

Drop Height (m)

DHL Next Day FedEx Prioirity Overnight UPS Overnight

Figure 6. Next-day delivery: percentage of drop heights below a given level.

of 0.86 m (DHL, next-day, 95% occurrence) means
that 95% of all drops were below this level. The
packages experienced over 100–200 drops above
76 mm. Figures 5 and 6 present this information in
graphical form.
Table 4 presents the data in descending order
(10). The results show that while the second, third
and subsequent drop heights decrease rapidly for
both FedEx and UPS, they do not for DHL. Exclud-
ing the first five drops, DHL’s drop heights are up

Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 233 Packag. Technol. Sci. 2006; 19: 227–235
DOI: 10.1002/pts
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and Science
Table 4. Drop heights in descending order

Next-day Second-day

Drop height (m) DHL FedEx UPS DHL FedEx UPS

Highest 1.45 1.77 1.23 1.01 0.89 1.63

2nd Highest 1.14 1.03 1.02 0.98 0.89 1.00
3rd Highest 1.04 1.00 0.92 0.90 0.86 0.94
4th Highest 1.01 0.84 0.78 0.87 0.80 0.91
5th Highest 0.95 0.76 0.72 0.86 0.69 0.82
6th Highest 0.93 0.70 0.69 0.82 0.68 0.75
7th Highest 0.93 0.69 0.62 0.81 0.68 0.62
8th Highest 0.93 0.68 0.60 0.77 0.67 0.50
9th Highest 0.85 0.62 0.59 0.75 0.66 0.48
10th Highest 0.85 0.59 0.56 0.75 0.64 0.47

Table 5. Impact orientation

CONCLUSIONS
Orientation of drops (%) The highest drop heights measured during ship-
ments are one-time events that give a distorted
Shipment type Face Edge Corner picture of carrier performance. For the purposes of
laboratory simulation of handling conditions, the
DHL 83.69 7.61 8.69 95% occurrence level is considered more appro-
Next-day FedEx 91.41 6.25 2.34 priate. Based on the 95% data in Tables 1, 2 and 3,
UPS 93.16 2.56 4.27
DHL 82.17 7.75 10.08 the handling environments within FedEx and UPS
Second-day FedEx 88.46 6.04 5.49 are not significantly different between ground
UPS 93.27 4.81 1.92 shipping, second-day and next-day. Regardless of
package size and weight of packages studied, the
95% level drop heights are all within the range
0.46–0.86 m. DHL drop heights are consistently
higher, by up to 50%, but are still within the limits
to 50% higher than those within FedEx and UPS. stated above. In view of the recent merger (DHL
This difference is about 30 cm at most. Table 3 and Airborne Express), this may be due to ineffi-
shows the same trends with 10% of the drop ciencies that need to be sorted out. The measured
heights exceeding about 0.66 m for DHL versus 0.5 drop heights have also not changed much from the
m for UPS and FedEx. first study (4) in 1992 to subsequent ones (5,6,7) in
Table 5 shows the percentage of impacts result- 1996, 2001 and 2004 and the present study. Larger
ing in drops onto the faces, edges and corners. This and heavier packages tend to be placed near floor
is also shown graphically in Figure 7. In true free level and smaller and lighter packages on top
falls from the drop heights in Tables 3 and 4, the when loading a truck, so large and heavier pack-
packages should land on edges and corners most ages tend to experience lower drop heights.
of the time. The fact that face drops accounted for
80% of all drops suggests that these drops were
either controlled (guided) free falls resulting ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
from handlers unloading top packages or from
packages bouncing up and down during The authors would like to thank Instrumented Sensor
transportation. Technology, Inc., Okemos, MI, USA for providing the

Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 234 Packag. Technol. Sci. 2006; 19: 227–235
DOI: 10.1002/pts
MEASUREMENT OF NEXT-DAY AIR SHIPPING ENVIRONMENT Packaging Technology
and Science
100

90

80

70

60

50

40

30

20

10

0
DHL FedEx UPS DHL FedEx UPS
Next Day Second Day

Face Edge Corner

Figure 7. Percentage of face, edge and corner drops.

instrumentation to use in this study. The study was
funded by the Consortium of Distribution Packaging
Research, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI,
USA.
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Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 235 Packag. Technol. Sci. 2006; 19: 227–235
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