Local delivery
Road Runner Courier: zone-based pricing for a local delivery site
An Alabama courier and mobile-notary company that hired us for a full site design and a zone-based delivery rate model. The design prototype is delivered, the WordPress build is in progress on our staging server, and the client has committed to three years of hosting.
- Client
- Road Runner Courier Services LLC
- Year
- 2026
- Timeline
- Design prototype delivered August 2026. Build in progress as of October 2026.
- What we built
- FigmaWordPressWooCommerceCustom WooCommerce rate engine (Geoapify)Shared hosting
The challenge
Road Runner Courier Services runs express two-hour, same-day, and next-day delivery across Madison County, Alabama, plus a mobile public-notary service. Their drivers move medical materials and legal documents, which means careful handling and a defensible chain of custody. The people who run the company answer email fast and decide in days.
Pricing is where a courier lives or dies. Their existing site prices by distance: a flat rate up to a mileage cap, then a per-mile charge beyond it. Every job outside the flat zone turns into a phone call and a quote worked out by hand. What the owner asked us for is a site that carries the pricing itself: delivery zones defined up front, a rate that follows the zone, and a customer who can see the number before picking up the phone. We did not build their current public site. This case study covers the replacement we are building for them.
What we did
We designed first and built second. The full site prototype, covering every service tier from express runs to the notary service, was delivered in Figma in August 2026. The owner reviewed it and signed off on the direction.
The build runs on WordPress with WooCommerce, hosted on our staging server while the rate model is finished. Alongside the design and build, Road Runner committed to three years of shared hosting through us, paid in September 2026. A multi-year commitment from an operating business says the relationship is planned to last past launch day.
What exists on the preview today
The preview build carries the whole service story: express two-hour, same-day, and next-day delivery, scheduled routes, Saturday delivery, multiple-stop runs, medical materials and legal documents, and the mobile notary service, each on its own page with contact and about pages alongside. WooCommerce is wired in, with a cart and checkout, and Shipday is connected for delivery logistics.
The rate engine itself is built: address verification, driving distance, and per-service pricing are in place and go live at checkout once the owner settles the numbers. Notary booking and the customer mileage map are still in development. This is a live build, and we would rather say that than dress a preview up as a launch.
The rate engine
The core of the build is a custom WooCommerce rate engine, not a flat rate with a per-mile kicker. A customer enters a pickup and a drop-off; both addresses are verified against a geocoder, and a drop-off outside the service region, or one that does not match its own house number and postcode, is refused before any money is quoted. From there the engine measures real driving distance rather than a straight line, and prices the job from a table of service rates covering express two-hour, same-day, next-day, medical and legal runs, scheduled routes, Saturday delivery, multiple stops, and the notary service.
Package count, distance, and floor and ceiling rules feed the same calculation, and the owner can change the numbers without touching code, which matters because her own rates moved between drafts.
The next phase is zone pricing: rings drawn around the pickup point so a quote follows the zone rather than the mile, with per-package charges past an included count and rush and weekend additions. That work is specified, not shipped. The exact boundaries and per-package rates are being settled with the owner now, because a pricing page that disagrees with the invoice is worse than no pricing page at all.
What comes next
The build moves to the client's domain once the rate model is settled and tested. Until then, her current public site stays as it is, and the preview lives on our staging server.
We will update this case study when the site ships. Launch numbers, once they exist and the owner is willing to share them, belong here too. Nothing on this page should read further along than the work actually is.
Results
- Service pages: eight delivery tiers plus an overview
- 9
- Services in one build: courier runs and a mobile notary
- 2
- Hosting commitment, paid September 2026
- 3 years
- Custom rate engine, active development
- In build
Related industries
Gallery
Screens from the preview build on our staging server. The client's public site is unchanged until launch.
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Road Runner Courier Services LLC · www.skyhighdesigns.com