GLS Companies history

41 years before the home was built, in 1859, a map was drawn of San Francisco.

John Muir first visited the Sierras, 140 miles east of San Francisco across the great Central Valley, in 1868.

As Syracuse information studies professor Milton Mueller notes, by 1920, “the United States telephone network was geographically universal,” meaning it reached everywhere, but there were only 13 phones per 100 people.

Whereas when the Hetch Hetchy Valley was flooded in 1923 to provide a reservoir of water for a growing San Francisco, only its act of destruction was visible from the Sierras.

By 1928, the year after 140 New Montgomery was completed, the San Francisco Examiner declared “with clay from a hole in the ground in Lincoln, California, the modern city of San Francisco has come.”

Winston Churchill paid a visit to 140 New Montgomery in September of 1929, about a month before the stock market crash augured the Great Depression.

In 1930, the city of San Francisco bought out the Spring Valley Water Company, bringing the source of its water supply under municipal control.

Their foundation, formed in 1951, donated more than $680 million to environmental and other causes.

Global Location Strategies was initially created in the 1970’s as an ancillary service offering within Fluor Corporation, a Fortune 500 engineering and construction firm, at their Greenville, SC office.

GLS acquires shares in Direzione Gruppo Executive (DGE). DGE started in 1977 as the franchise association Corriere Executive, ultimately becoming Direzione Gruppo Executive.

The company started in 1979 as an urban coordination centre for couriers based on the London and New York bicycle-courier office model.

Nederlandse Pakket Dienst was started in 1980 as a franchise association.

In 1989, 25 brave forwarders had a daring idea: build a national parcel service provider in the center of Germany.

The roots of the Austrian subsidiary, which is based in Ansfelden, date back to 1992, when ten medium-sized Austrian carriers joined together to form a franchise association able to offer customers high-quality parcel delivery services.

In 1994, it took its first step towards the new networked Europe by becoming a member of the international parcel logistics association General Parcel.

The company, founded in 1997, is a General Parcel partner and offers its customers both national and international parcel solutions.

The Hungarian parcel carrier, founded in 1998, is a partner in the European General Parcel cooperation.

GLS acquired its initial shares in DGE in December 2000.

In 2004, following extensive restructuring, the Irish parcel and logistics service provider is renamed GLS Ireland.

Following its foundation in 2005, GLS Portugal had adapted its production processes and IT systems to those of the Group, expanded capacity and modernised its sites.

ZUMEx (ZUM 2010) is its new partner in Croatia.

In 2012, GLS Germany was the first GLS company to introduce the service.

After the foundation of the company in May 2013 GLS had established its own network of locations.

GLS Group raises the ISO certificates of the quality and environmental management system of operative subsidiaries in 18 countries to 2015 standards (ISO 9001:2015 and ISO 14001:2015).

In April 2016, GLS announces the acquisition of express parcel delivery company ASM Transporte Urgente, the second largest express delivery network in the country.

On 1 February 2018, the GLS Group announces the acquisition of the Murcian transport company Redyser in Spain.

From June 2019, Estafeta will deliver GLS consignments in Mexico and, in a second step, will feed parcels for Europa and North America into the GLS network.