What does it take to build a last-mile delivery business that survives four decades, a financial crisis, and the rise — and tightening grip — of Amazon? Tony Razza, founder of Elite Home Delivery in Massachusetts, has lived that story firsthand.
In Episode 7 of the HappyFleet podcast, host Robert Fierro sits down with Tony for a candid conversation about starting at 19 with a single truck, running both an Amazon DSP and a FedEx ISP simultaneously, and ultimately walking away from both to double down on his white-glove roots. Here’s what stood out.
Starting from Zero (at 19)
Tony bought his first truck in 1985 for $26,000 — a number that feels almost quaint compared to today’s $126,000 price tag. He started as a subcontractor, hired one helper, and learned the business from the ground up. It took four to five years to go from one truck to three, and another few decades to reach 75.
His path to growth wasn’t flashy. It was about learning, weathering downturns (2008 nearly derailed everything), and gradually letting go of the belief that he had to do it all himself.
“Delegating is probably the hardest thing to do when growing a business.”
For him, the shift happened around 10–15 trucks — the point where it became physically impossible to wear every hat.
The DSP Chapter: Great Until It Wasn’t
In 2019, Tony jumped into Amazon’s Delivery Service Partner program when it was still relatively new. The pitch was compelling: a built-in revenue stream, no need to chase sales, and real growth potential.
“It was a cash cow in the beginning,” he says. But over six and a half years, the story changed. Amazon gradually tightened its control — over routing, pay scales, maintenance, and more. The breaking point came when Amazon announced it would take over vehicle repair costs. Sounds like good news, right? Not quite.
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Amazon pulled back a portion of DSP revenue to fund those repairs. For Tony, whose in-house team could fix a van in an hour for $150, the change made him less efficient and more expensive. “We actually lost money because we were efficient,” he explains. Shortly after, he exited.
It’s a dynamic many long-tenured DSPs recognize: the program rewards compliance, not ingenuity. “You’re a business owner, but it’s not really your business,” Tony says. For operators coming in fresh, that trade-off might be fine. For someone who’s run independent operations for 30+ years, it becomes untenable.
ISP vs. DSP: The Differences Matter
Before leaving packages entirely, Tony also ran a FedEx ISP operation for about three years before selling it in October 2025. The contrast with DSP is instructive.
With FedEx, Tony owned the zip codes he serviced — territory that didn’t change. He handled his own routing. Drivers stayed longer because pay was more flexible.
“In the FedEx ISP world, we had drivers stay for years. The turnover was a lot less.”
The DSP model, by contrast, can place you wherever Amazon needs coverage. Revenue per stop is preset. Pay scales are set. You can pay drivers more if you want, but only what your revenue allows — which, as margins compress, isn’t much.
The Hiring Reality Nobody Talks About
Ask any DSP owner what keeps them up at night, and hiring usually tops the list. Tony is no exception.
His biggest surprise after decades in white-glove delivery? The turnover. “I’ve seen things I’ve never seen in 35 years of business,” he says. The challenge is structural: Amazon sets the pay floor, and entry-level drivers churn quickly, especially around peak season when operators bring on 30–50 new hires who may only stay a few months.
Tony’s approach to managing new drivers during peak: incentivize everyone, not just drivers. Getting management staff personally invested in driver metrics changed the culture. Pair that with in-cab cameras providing real-time alerts, and you can coach a driver within seconds of a stop sign violation — not days later.
His biggest hiring lesson? “Believing everything they say and running with it.” The people who look best on paper sometimes underperform. The ones you’re not sure about sometimes become your best drivers. The only real solution is volume and accountability.
Technology: Pragmatic, Not Evangelical
Tony describes himself as “old school” on tech — and he’s self-aware about it. But he’s seen what cameras have done for fleet safety: a roughly 70% reduction in accidents.
He uses DispatchTrack for route management and customer notifications, and telematics for vehicle tracking. AI is on his radar but not yet in production. When Robert mentions new systems that use AI to review dashcam footage and distinguish reckless driving from reactive driving (like hard-braking to avoid a pedestrian), Tony’s reaction is immediate: “That’s priceless.”
It’s a good signal. The operators who’ve spent decades in the trenches often have the clearest sense of where technology can actually move the needle — because they know exactly what the manual version costs them.
What Success Actually Looks Like
After 40 years, Tony’s definition of success is grounded. “Being able to support my family, put a roof over their head, watch my kids grow.” He’s clear-eyed about what the grind cost him in family time, and equally clear that no one hands you a better system — you have to build it yourself, over time.
His parting advice:
“Do the things that no one else wants to do, and do it consistently. You’ll be successful.”
For anyone in last-mile delivery — whether you’re just starting out, knee-deep in a DSP, or thinking about life after packages — that’s as good a north star as any.
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This post is based on Episode 7 of the HappyFleet podcast. Listen to the full conversation with Tony Razza of Elite Home Delivery wherever you get your podcasts.
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