QUEENS Business Spotlight

 By Caryn Eve Murray.
Newsday, October 6, 1996

 FOR MOST of his nine years in the courier-messenger industry,Ray Rafeek has been getting to know the avenues.

When he first set out in 1987 with a $3,500 Chevy van, he simply wantedto learn the thoroughfares crisscrossing Queens. "My father sat with meand as we drove around, he would say, `This is Queens Boulevard,' and hewould show me the different areas," Rafeek said.

And it proved to be the best introduction a new immigrant could want:After finally being reunited with his parents, whose arrival from Guyanahad preceded his, Rafeek hired himself out to courier companies, learningas he went.

Then, after two businessmen friends urged him to start his own company,promising their corporate accounts as his first and most formidable clients,Rafeek found himself desperately seeking some alternate routes. By 1991,his own business, 24 Hours Courier Service, had come to fruition -  but his acquaintances' promises had not.

"So I had to go out and, literally, knock on doors," Rafeek said. Operating out of a small office on the Avenue of the Americas, he secured his first account  -  Triangle Press, a Manhattan publisher that, hundreds of door-knocks later, is still with him. Indeed, Triangle stands among about 300 steady clients of Rafeek's company on West 37th Street, which handles more than 500 document and package deliveries daily, most of them by foot, by bicycle or by van, and mostly in Manhattan.

     Serving primarily the garment, legal, publishingand advertising industries, the 39-year-old Bayside resident also dispatches50 or so messengers to the other boroughs, Long Island and New Jersey.Even Rhode Island isn't out of the question, as shown one day recentlywhen one of Rafeek's messengers delivered boxes there for an insurancecompany.

     "I don't like to think about the problems,because then you don't think about doing business," Rafeek said. "Thereare some people who just complain. But I say you do what you have to do,you don't allow things to be a setback."

     Still, his ever-expanding business terrainhas prompted yet another search for mastery of the avenues  - the avenues, in this case, that cut across troublesome political and regulatoryturf that could stymie his business.

     When reforms in federal tax law changed employers'responsibilities to independent contractors  -  messengers andcouriers among them  - Rafeek became involved as a New York area delegateto last year's White House Conference on Small Business in Washington,D.C., and served on committees pressing Congress for legislative relief.

     And with city traffic regulations restrictingvans' ability to park in midtown Manhattan  -  making problematic24 Hours Courier's assignments for delivery on Fashion Avenue  - Rafeek has decided to maintain a high profile, through membership in theCaribbean-American Chamber of Commerce and Industry, based in Brooklyn,and trade groups such as the New York State Messenger and Courier Association,based in Manhattan, where he is one of the directors.

     Despite businesses' increasing reliance onfax machines and modems, the courier industry thrives. The $10-billion-a-yearnational industry "is an easy enough business to get into," said CarleneMackereth, editor of Courier Magazine, an industry quarterly based in Manassas,Va.

     To stay independent, however, is quite anothermatter: The courier industry has seen its share of mergers and acquisitionsby giants such as U.S. Delivery in Houston, Consolidated Delivery and Logisticsin Paramus, N.J., and United TransNet, in Atlanta, Ga.

     "Acquisition is fairly common in this industry.You buy customer lists and goodwill," said Bill Goodman, editor of theCourier Times, a Flushing-based weekly for the regional industry. Accordingto Goodman, the New York City / Long Island market still has about 250local courier businesses, whose specialty is priority ground transportationby foot, bicycle and van.

     Mackereth said Rafeek is "active, he's outthere networking and creating business." He is on the editorial advisoryboard of Courier Magazine. And he and his wife, Shafi, give back to Guyana.He is a founding director of the Corriverton Association, based in Jamaica,Queens, which raises funds to help the Guyanese community from which thegroup takes its name. The couple have three children.

     Meanwhile, 24 Hours Courier Service is alsoraising some major funds for its own business benefit. Rafeek said hiscompany had sales of about $1 million last year  -  double theprevious year and well within what Goodman considers an average small company'shealthy range, from $200,000 a year to just under $4 million.

     Now, with a $40,000 loan he recently got fromChase Bank, backed by a U.S. Small Business Administration guarantee, Rafeekhas been able to add new sales staff to his roster of 16 employees andto upgrade to a fully computerized operation, complete with custom softwareto track deliveries and billing.

     "For my first three years in business, allthe banks told me I needed to have a track record, and so I had no accessto capital," he said. "And I said to myself, `I will have my house in orderand when my time comes, I will reach out to the banks and they will notturn me down.' "

     Rafeek again found the right avenue and thissummer, the bank delivered. And now Rafeek plans to continue expandingdelivery to clients, if need be, in new ways. Indeed, he is pondering thelikelihood of a related business, doing home deliveries from restaurantsin eastern Queens.

"There are so many good restaurants out there," Rafeek said.