The courier market and parcel delivery has registered significant growth, but margins have decreased. Express and courier companies have been strongly involved in the growth of the parcel couriers and deliveries market. Specifically, small businesses have increased their number by 31.7% compared to 2017. Other operators such as Amazon, Poste Italiane, Brit, DHL, UPS, and FedEx-TNT also saw significant increases in their revenues, with Amazon recognized as the leading company in package deliveries in Italy. The rise of e-commerce was crucial for this boom. Over ten years, the value of online product purchases has gone from €9.5 billion to €42.6 billion, presenting new challenges to last-mile suppliers.

The big brands need an efficient and economical delivery service that can handle profitability margins. However, these changes have also brought problems. Italian cities, especially historic centers, are forced to face congestion and different access rules. Operators must overcome long extraurban routes and compressed schedules to reach small or distant destinations. Additionally, old trucks over 15 years old have been replaced by new robots, but these technologies are still not completely integrated with current procedures. The market has also seen a significant increase in operational costs, including fleet sizes being sized based on the peaks of delivery demand.

This has led to a reduction in overall profitability on individual deliveries, with the average package revenue falling from €6.20 in 2021 to just €5.98 by 2025. To address these issues, operators focus on recovering profits from individual orders. According to Valentina Pontiggia, director of the School of Management's Online Retail E-commerce B2C Observatory at Politecnico di Milano, 'if they stock, manage fleets, and organize logistics around peak demand for delivery'. The priority for operators is therefore finding innovative solutions that allow them to maintain profits while facing these challenges.

This requires interdisciplinary collaboration between sector professionals, entrepreneurs, and local authorities to find economically viable and efficient solutions. However, even with significant changes in the industry, Italian cities will still face challenges such as traffic congestion and different access rules. Operators will be strongly involved in the search for innovative solutions that help them survive and thrive in this boom.