Marshall Field’s never asked, “What’s the cheapest way to do business?”
They asked, “What’s best for the buyer?”
The rest takes care of itself.
It helps solve the NIMBY.com, “Not In My Back Yard” problem in every field and endeavor.
Look at the problem through other people’s perspective, not just your own.
Evan Kirstel
You thought same-day delivery was a modern invention?
In 1872, Marshall Field’s was already doing it — for free — with horses.
What began with delivery boys sprinting packages through Chicago’s crowded streets quietly grew into something extraordinary: hundreds of wagons, nearly 700 horses, neighborhood distribution hubs, uniformed drivers, and routes precision-engineered to cover roughly 350 square miles. No software. No sensors. Just operational discipline, obsessive attention to detail, and an unwavering commitment to the customer.
Fast forward 150 years, and last-mile delivery is entering its next chapter.
Robots navigating sidewalks. Drones testing aerial corridors. AI optimizing routes in real time. Autonomous vans transforming logistics into a rolling data platform. The hardware looks like science fiction — but the real differentiator hasn’t changed since the Field’s era.
Marshall Field’s never asked, “What’s the cheapest way to deliver?”
They asked, “What’s best for the buyer?”
That question is still the right one — whether you’re dispatching a horse-drawn wagon or a fleet of autonomous bots:
👉 Technology should disappear into the experience if the customer notices it, it’s in the way.
👉 Speed without reliability isn’t a feature. It’s a promise you broke.
👉 Logistics isn’t infrastructure. It’s your brand reputation moving through the street.
The last-mile race won’t be won by whoever has the coolest robot or drone. It won’t be won on unit economics alone, or on the strength of a patent portfolio.
It will be won by whoever truly understands what Marshall Field’s proved more than a century ago:
Make it effortless for customers to get what they want, when they want it, where they want it.
The rest is just logistics.
cc Scott Luton
