In a deal for an undisclosed sum, Royal Mail this afternoon announced it had acquired Nottingham-based tech firm StoreFeeder.
StoreFeeder built Royal Mail’s consumer and small business shipping tool, Click and Drop, which launched in October 2014, and the acquisition announcement follows a series of developments at Royal Mail Group aimed at the smaller end of the SME retail sector. (See: Royal Mail courts eBay sellers with new service roll-out and Parcelforce debuts flexible service offering for etailers).
In a statement issued this afternoon, Royal Mail said StoreFeeder’s other clients would not be affected by the acquisition, and described the financial terms of the transaction as “not material in the context of the Royal Mail Group as a whole.”
As well as allowing consumers and small businesses to ship with Royal Mail within a few clicks, Click and Drop enables eBay sellers to integrate their accounts and buy and print postage labels without manually inputting the address of each individual buyer. Click and Drop now also offers PayPal as a payment method in addition to credit and debit cards.
Nick Landon, Managing Director of Royal Mail Parcels, said: “Having successfully developed and launched our new shipping tool which has worked very effectively through the busy Christmas period, the acquisition of StoreFeeder was a clear strategic choice. I’m delighted that we will now be able to accelerate the development and release of even more tools to make shipping parcels with Royal Mail easier and more convenient.”