Depending on what is being transported and how much they can afford, the patient(s) involved will choose a manual transport service, a commercial carrier such as DHL or FedEx, or something in between, such as a combination of commercial flights and local courier. which Loewen relied on during the pandemic. The cost of transporting my eggs with FlyVet Europa was 1,300 euros, or about $1,400 at the time. This includes the price of two one-way tickets for Paolo and the case of eggs, and some additional expenses. (When I told Monaco how many eggs were traveling, he said, “Uno squadro di calcio!”, a soccer team).
CryoStork, Cryoport’s division dedicated to the fertility sector, offers all three levels of service: commercial carriers for something that can be easily replaced (sperm, in other words), a mid-level service with local courier and air transport , and a door-to-door carry-on service – for prices ranging from a few hundred dollars to $7,000 or $8,000 for an international carry-on trip.
Ultimately, the pandemic boosted Loewen’s business. Today, he and a team of eight colleagues, half employed and half working on consignment, handle 30 to 40 IVF-related consignments each month. Similarly, when the war began in Ukraine, Loewen and other colleagues received frantic requests from clients desperate to move their biomaterials out of the capital, Kyiv, where most of the IVF clinics and surrogacy agencies in the country, and the business moved to nearby Georgia. But in September, Loewen planned to deliver biomaterials to Ukraine again. “People want to have babies, conflict or not,” she says.
The right things
What does it take to be a tissue courier and how do you get into the field? Everyone I spoke to told me that to be successful you need to love to travel, have a calm personality (in case, as happened to Loewen, you are ever surrounded by a knot of armed Belarusian soldiers airport and accused of human organ trafficking), and be adept at solving problems.
Loewen is looking for people with experience in the travel industry, who can navigate new cities and who won’t be put off by a flight cancellation or a grumpy customs official. Cryoport’s Mark Sawicki has several former pilots now working as couriers; their security clearances allow them to move through airports more easily than civilians.
Nicole Dorman, 43, has always loved children; he jokes that his current job as a courier is “babysitting”. He has three children, ages 14 to 22, and has been a teacher’s aide and school crossing guard after four years in the US Army. When he’s home for a week or two at a time with his kids between gigs, he also makes deliveries for DoorDash in Clarksville, Tennessee.
WENN RIGHTS LTD / ALAMY STOCK PHOTO
Dorman had started by transporting stem cells for a courier service based in Frankfurt. When he was looking for work in November 2020, he emailed half a dozen IVF courier companies and received a response from Loewen within 15 minutes. He has been working for him ever since, and also ships to the US for the Ukrainian company ARK Cryo, as well as EmbryoPort, a UK-based company.
Dorman is on the road approximately 70% of each month; When we spoke in mid-May, he was preparing for a week-long trip that began with a pick-up in Indianapolis, a drop-off in Bratislava, a train ride from there to Prague for another pick-up, and then a flight to Greece Like all couriers who have been working for a long time, he has frequent flyer status. In the 18 months since it started, it has carried more than 90 shipments. “Now I can pretty much do it in my sleep,” he says.
