Flowers have a long history of being used for gifts and to accompany messages of love and affection. During the modern age, people started to have the ability to send flowers to both local and international destinations, through the rise of floral wire services and flower distribution networks. Since the advent of the Internet, the ability to send flowers around the world has increased, with better communication channels between customers, individual florists, and relay services. In fact, it is not just the florist industry which has benefited from online commerce and global distribution, with many other industries expanding their operations as a direct result of the Internet. In the 21st century, there are a range of industries that operate on a global scale, sending goods to customers all around the world and conducting sales on the Internet. Along with the ability to send flowers online (blume2000) , all Internet based businesses rely in one way or another on shipping and distribution.
While it is certainly not the only example, pizza delivery is perhaps the clearest example of a delivery based service that has expanded through the Internet. While home delivery has always been a big part of the pizza business, the Internet has allowed for a greater degree of efficiency and automation. Once pizza businesses have set up a website and an e-commerce system, the process of taking orders is automated and fairly inexpensive to operate in comparison with traditional ordering systems. However, it is not just the flower and pizza industries who have benefited from online ordering and shipping however, with practically every industry under the sun now utilising the Internet for sales and customer service.
Online commerce has globalised many aspects of small and large scale economies, by allowing small and large businesses to reach out to a global market. Because online sales are totally independent of geographical location, businesses can market their products and sell their goods and services without limit. However, delivery structures and distribution networks have become integral to online commerce, with many businesses needing to send their products around the world on a regular basis. While florists may have been one of the original businesses sending orders around the globe through floral relay services, many businesses in the 21st century rely on a similar structure in order to keep their businesses truly international.