Moneybox Why the FedEx merger with Kinko’s should make UPS nervous. By Daniel Gross Jan 20, 20046:13 PM For people of a certain age—say, their mid-30s— Kinko’s occupied the borderland between Slackerdom and the real world. The copy stores were the destination of choice for the last-minute laser-printing of late papers or for that hasty résumé run. But in the past several years, under the ownership of Texas private equity firm Clayton, Dubilier & Rice, the collection of franchises has morphed into an altogether jazzier and more ambitious corporation: a “global, digitally connected provider of an array of valuable business services.” With 1,200 stores and sales of about $2 billion, Kinko’s now peddles printing services to small businesses and document-management (read: copying) services for large corporations. FedEx, the largest overnight-delivery company in the United States, ratified the turnaround by announcing in late December that it would acquire Kinko’s for $2.4 billion in cash. P...
