By Loretta Chao And Laura Stevens 

Online shoppers accustomed to having their packages dropped off by United Parcel Service Inc. and FedEx Corp. increasingly are being visited by rivals that specialize in delivering items such as furniture, appliances and mattresses.

Sales of bulky items are rising faster than online orders overall as customers become more comfortable making big-ticket purchases online. Retailers including Home Depot Inc. and Best Buy Co. are fueling the shift with free shipping on goods like patio chairs and washing machines.

That trend is sparking a boom in so-called white glove services that involve delivering, setting up or installing large or delicate items. Among the largest of these upstart providers are XPO Logistics Inc., Pilot Freight Services and Fidelitone Inc. These companies and others have gained market share by offering competitive pricing on shipping and throwing in services, such as trash removal and furniture assembly.

They are making a play for this fast-growing e-commerce market as the two giants in the package delivery business take a step back. FedEx and UPS carry oversize items as freight, but aren't broadly set up for installation and other services. Both recently raised fees for oversize-goods, which they say interfere with their hub operations. The U.S. Postal Service also typically steers clear of delivering large items due to the small size of its mail trucks.

"Those [services] are things that we do that UPS and FedEx don't do. So it's giving these shippers the option" of offering set up and installations to their customers, said Daniel Sayne, director of sales for Illinois-based Fidelitone, which offers white glove service out of 25 U.S. distribution hubs and from client locations in nine markets. "The rates are still new, and shippers are still trying to get their hands around what their options are."

The for-hire home delivery market for heavy and oversize items grew 8% in the past year to $6.8 billion, according to Satish Jindel, president of SJ Consulting Group Inc., a parcel industry research firm. He says the cost of providing delivery and set up for goods such as a refrigerator is between $70 and $80, and can run more than $300 including moving goods from a manufacturer's warehouse to the delivery company.

Some retailers absorb the cost for their customers and others charge fees to cover the added expense. Lowe's Cos., for instance, offers free delivery on appliances. West Elm, a subsidiary of Williams-Sonoma Inc., charges for most deliveries and has employees who can help with assembly for an additional fee.

Fidelitone expects to complete 600,000 white-glove shipments this year, up 20% from 2014. XPO, the largest such service by volume, expects to make about nine million white-glove deliveries out of its 55 distribution centers in the U.S. and Canada. IKEA, Lowe's Cos. and online mattress startup Casper Sleep Inc. are among its clients. XPO took in $489.4 million from its "last mile" home deliveries in the first nine months of 2015, up 35% from a year earlier.

Parcel delivery typically requires just one driver making many quick stops on a preplanned route. White-glove deliveries often require two people or more, with some stops taking minutes, others hours. Drivers might need to know how to hang a television or assemble furniture without damaging walls or scuffing floors in the process. White-glove companies said training is a major focus, and some, including XPO, give drivers smartphone packed with instruction manuals.

"We're not delivering freight, we're delivering product into some very sacred areas of people's homes," said Will O'Shea, chief sales officer at XPO Last Mile, the company's white glove unit. The services train their employees in greeting customers, dressing appropriately and getting customers' approval when completing a set up.

The business is so new that not all the kinks have been ironed out, some customers say. Sam Mazaheri, a 27-year-old marketing strategist in Sunnyvale, Calif., said when he turned to the Internet to outfit his new home, the process didn't go smoothly.

A television shipped via FedEx arrived cracked. XPO, of Greenwich, Conn., initially didn't bring enough laborers to carry a refrigerator up a flight of stairs, requiring a second trip. When the appliance turned out to be damaged, they mistakenly left it at his home instead of taking it back. By the time the refrigerator was successfully installed, weeks had passed. He posted a complaint about his experience online, prompting XPO to call and offer him a $50 gift card for his trouble.

"I would have paid extra if there was some kind of company that took the hassle out of it," he said.

Retailers say the services provided by white glove delivery is crucial. Casper Sleep initially delivered and installed mattresses and later used UPS for nationwide delivery. But it switched in many locations to XPO to get the in-home services, said Neil Parikh, the retailer's chief operating officer.

White-glove delivery companies say they're beefing up customer service, calling customers to check on service after a delivery and offering online tracking. Fidelitone also has "furniture medics" at its hubs to repair scratches and check for missing parts.

Write to Loretta Chao at loretta.chao@wsj.com and Laura Stevens at laura.stevens@wsj.com

 

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(END) Dow Jones Newswires

November 17, 2015 14:45 ET (19:45 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2015 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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