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50 free FedEx trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
46 free FedEx trivia questions with answers. FedEx started as a Yale term paper, flew 186 packages on its first night, and once covered a fuel bill with blackjack winnings. This quiz covers the company from Little Rock to the Memphis Superhub: Fred Smith's Marine Corps years, the Falcon 20s and 727s, the ZapMail fax flop, the Flying Tigers, Kinko's and TNT deals, and the spin-off of FedEx Freight. It also takes in the brand everyone knows: the arrow hidden in the logo, the purple and orange, the 'absolutely, positively' slogan, Cast Away and its unopened package, the FedEx Cup, FedExField and the Grizzlies' arena. Geography fans get the hubs from Indianapolis to Guangzhou. Questions run from easy to expert, and every answer has been checked against a primary or encyclopaedic source.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01FedEx was founded in 1971 in which city, before moving its operations two years later?
Little Rock, Arkansas
Fred Smith left after Little Rock's airport showed little interest in supporting his airline for packages.
Q 02Which city is home to FedEx's headquarters and its main air hub?
Memphis, Tennessee
Nearly 400 FedEx flights a day leave the city's airport, mostly at night.
Q 03Fred Smith first sketched the idea for a next-day delivery network in what?
A term paper at Yale
His professor was unimpressed; Smith later said he could not remember the grade he got.
Q 04Before shortening it in 1994, what was FedEx's full original name?
Federal Express
'FedEx' had been the nickname for years, and it was made official for marketing purposes.
Q 05On its first night of operations in April 1973, how many packages did FedEx carry?
186
Fourteen small jets linked 25 US cities that night; by the 2020s the Memphis hub was handling over a million packages a night.
Q 06The company began nightly service in 1973 with a fleet of fourteen small jets made by which manufacturer?
Dassault
The Falcon 20s were business jets converted to carry cargo; the airline could not buy big aircraft until deregulation in 1977.
Q 07Legend says FedEx's Fred Smith turned the company's last $5,000 into $27,000 in Las Vegas playing what?
Blackjack
He had just been turned down for capital by General Dynamics in Chicago when he impulsively hopped on a flight west.
Q 08Complete the famous FedEx slogan: 'When it absolutely, positively has to be there ...'
Overnight
The tag ran under the 'Fast Paced World' commercial starring John Moschitta Jr., television's fastest talker.
Q 09After the 1977 Airline Deregulation Act, what were the first large aircraft FedEx bought?
Boeing 727s
Seven 727-100s joined the fleet; by the 2020s FedEx flew the world's largest fleet of wide-body cargo jets.
Q 10ZapMail, launched in 1984 and a costly flop, was a FedEx service for sending what?
Faxes
It promised up to five pages delivered in under two hours for $35, and lost the company hundreds of millions of dollars.
Q 11Which cargo airline did FedEx buy in the late 1980s, becoming the world's largest full-service cargo airline?
Flying Tiger Line
The deal brought international routes and a much bigger fleet.
Q 12FedEx Ground began life as RPS, a subsidiary of which company FedEx bought in 1998?
Caliber System
The purchase turned an overnight air courier into a company that also did ground parcels, expedited freight and logistics.
Q 13Which chain of copy shops did FedEx buy in 2004 and later rename FedEx Office?
Kinko's
The chain had grown from a single sidewalk copy machine beside UC Santa Barbara in 1970.
Q 21Which real person appears as himself when Chuck is welcomed home in the 2000 Tom Hanks film?
FedEx founder Fred Smith
The scene was shot at FedEx's own home facilities in Memphis.
Q 22Stranded on his island, Tom Hanks's Chuck Noland refuses to open one FedEx package. What is painted on it?
Golden angel wings
He carries it off the island unopened and delivers it at the end of the film.
Q 23Chuck Noland's companion on the island is a volleyball named after which sporting goods brand?
Wilson
He draws a face on it in his own blood after cutting his hand trying to start a fire.
Q 14Kinko's founder Paul Orfalea got his nickname from what?
His curly hair
He opened the first shop in 1970 with a single sidewalk copy machine in Isla Vista, California.
Q 15In 2015 FedEx paid €4.4 billion for TNT Express, a courier headquartered in which country?
The Netherlands
TNT had long been based in Hoofddorp, near Amsterdam.
Q 16TNT, bought by FedEx in 2015, started in 1946 with a single truck in which city?
Adelaide
The initials stood for Thomas Nationwide Transport, after founder Ken Thomas.
Q 17What is hidden in the negative space of the FedEx wordmark, between the 'E' and the 'x'?
A right-pointing arrow
A custom typeface based on Univers and Futura makes the arrow appear, symbolising speed and precision.
Q 18Who designed the FedEx wordmark in 1994?
Lindon Leader of Landor Associates
The logo has won dozens of design awards and is a staple of 'hidden meaning' lists.
Q 19Which two colours make up the standard FedEx logo that all units were told to adopt from 2016?
Purple and orange
For years each unit had its own second colour, such as green for Ground and red for Freight.
Q 20In which 2000 film does Tom Hanks play a FedEx troubleshooter stranded on a desert island?
Cast Away
FedEx lent its Memphis, Los Angeles and Moscow facilities, planes, trucks and uniforms to the production.
Q 24Starting in 2007, FedEx became title sponsor of the season-long playoffs of which sport?
PGA Tour golf
The FedEx Cup was the first playoff system in men's professional golf.
Q 25Which golfer won the FedEx Cup in 2016, 2019 and 2022?
Rory McIlroy
Those three titles set the record; Tiger Woods won it twice, in 2007 and 2009.
Q 26From 1999 to 2024, FedEx held the naming rights to the stadium of which NFL team?
Washington Commanders
Fred Smith had bought a minority share of the team, then the Redskins, in 2003; the ground is now Northwest Stadium.
Q 27FedExForum, an arena the company sponsors, is home to which NBA team?
Memphis Grizzlies
The University of Memphis men's basketball team plays there too.
Q 28Which team ran the FedEx-sponsored No. 11 Toyota in the NASCAR Cup Series from 2005 to 2024?
Joe Gibbs Racing
Denny Hamlin drove the purple-and-orange car for the whole of that run.
Q 29In which US military branch did Fred Smith serve in Vietnam, earning a Silver Star?
The Marine Corps
He was a platoon leader and forward air controller, flying in the back seat of an OV-10.
Q 30Fred Smith founded the company in June 1971 with how much of his own inherited money?
Four million dollars
He then raised a further $91 million in venture capital, a record at the time.