Quicksilver Express Courier

A Twin Cities company that grew into six metros without becoming a national network — each market keeps its own dispatch and phone number, and the Minnesota operation, founded in 1982 and run out of Little Canada, is the original one.

On-demand work is sold by the clock: direct in 45 minutes, quick in one hour, an economy tier, and same-day by 5pm, with dispatch open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Beyond the metro, the Minnesota side runs scheduled routes out to Rochester and longer runs toward St Cloud, Duluth and Mankato, and over the border to Hudson and Eau Claire, and it handles MSP airport cargo recovery around the clock.

The service lines are unusually broad for a courier: on-demand and scheduled courier work, medical transport, dedicated drivers, and local and regional freight on a fleet running from vans to 26-foot straight trucks, 53-foot flatbeds, tractor trailers and specialty vehicles. Warehousing is a full line too — storage, cross-docking, pallet restacking, will-call, and inbound and outbound inventory tracking.

That range is worth knowing about if a job sits awkwardly between courier and freight. It is the kind of shipment most companies have to hand to two different vendors.