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About the author: Craig Raucher has spent the last 40 years holding senior level positions in 4 major domestic/international freight forwarding companies starting with DHL Airways in 1981.He has also started his own transportation consulting company. Prior to   and concurrent with his business background he has been involved in basketball both as a player and as a founder of a long tenured  basketball league  in  Staten Island , New York: The Staten Island Basketball League (www.sibl.us).

Background:DHL Airways in the late 1970’s was a new start up company  in  the international freight forwarding industry. The company pioneered a  revolutionary  new and fast way to move  documents around the world  safely and with tracking capability.

Larry Hilblom the “H” in DHL created a system which did not exist at that time  to move documents from various large USA cities to major cities around the world.

The other 2 founders of DHL were Dalsey  and Lind which made up the DHL name.

At that time, in the late seventies, if you wanted to send a 2 lb. document  from New York to London or a 3 lb contract  from Los Angeles to Rome or a 4 lb. manuscript from Chicago to  Hong Kong you had only 2 ways to do so and both ways were  very poor.

 You either used  United States Airmail or  you added your document to a heavy weight air freight shipment of hundreds of lbs.. Both options were less then ideal.

US Airmail at the time ( it no longer exists) had a reputation for losing documents or taking weeks to deliver.

In addition you could not track or trace a shipment. Many global documents ended up in a black hole and never seen again.

Adding your documents to the back of a heavyweight air freight shipment was an equally poor choice  as they were continually lost in transit and likewise could not be tracked to the consignee.

Larry Hilbloms revolutionary concept was the model that Federal Express eventually adopted for shipments within the USA.

Now having a unique and potentially global game changing idea was one thing but getting companies to use this service was a monumental challenge. Add to this that DHL in New York City was forming up as a new company  with all types of people working  in various divisions.

In 1981 I was hired by Larry Hilblom and several other senior inner circle directors to become the Director of Sales for New York City.

This was a new experience for me and I did not have all of the skill sets at that time that I eventually  learned over the years. Add to this pressure was that New York City was the potential crown jewel in the DHL world. All eyes were on us.

The other challenge for DHL in New York City then  was that we had, as was common in all transportation companies, different divisions. The operations group consisting of blue collar workers, accounting, customer service and sales ( white collar) and finance.

The 2 key divisions: sales and operations did not work together and at times their was hostility that created  continuous dissension within the company. This was a major roadblock for growth and unless these primary groups worked together growth was impossible.

As I began to develop the strategic business plan for developing growth through sales I began to spend time with the other divisions especially the operations group.

This division had over 100 people.Drivers, mechanics, warehousemen, maintenance people etc..

My goal was to find some way that we could all work together in common purpose and that way was through basketball. Many of the ops guys were black and latino and dozens  played ball. I was playing in various leagues at that time and discovered the their was  a highly competitive JFK Airport League. Teams from the various airlines and freight forwarding companies played in this league. Alitalia, United, Ameican, Lufthansa and British Airways had teams as did 10 other airlines.. Emery Air Freight, UPS, Fedex had teams in the league plus 12 other freight forwarding companies. The games were played at Baldwin Park (Baldwin, Long Island) outside under the lights. Photo below.

Baldwin Park had opened up a few years earlier  (1980)and was unique in that the surface of the floor was some type of rubber composition which was great to play on and unique for its time.

We started the first  DHL Airways basketball team in 1982 comprised of 15 players- drivers, warehouse managers, ramp managers and 3 senior executives. We played in that league from 1982 through 1990 winning the championship three times and getting to the finals and semi finals 4 times. I left DHL in 1991 to join another  global freight forwarder. The company sent a sam to that league for many years after I left.

DHL Airways grew from 1980 to 1991 to become  a billion dollar company and became the biggest courier company in the world at that time-today it ranks amongst the top three.

Although many other factors contributed to the company’s growth he unification of the operations, sales and other divisions was the springboard that catapulted the company to great heights.

The lessons of basketball that I learned from playing over the years for many different coaches and for many different teams guided me in developing this unique group of players. All from different backgrounds to play under one banner for common purpose.