While ecommerce was initially thought to be a boon during the coronavirus crisis, with stores and malls in lockdown, execution is proving to be anything but as a growing chorus of drivers and facility associates complain about the danger of exposure. Workers at Amazon, Instacart and Whole Foods staged protest walkouts.
While automated package lockers are being used by some major retailers here, they’ve seen greater adoption in other countries, having solved space and retail delivery issues for several years. Here is a look at how they’re being used in some European countries and Japan as a last-mile solution for retailers and a convenience for consumers.
With a showdown looming over international postal rates at a Sept. 24 congress of the Universal Postal Union, uncertainty reigns in terms of the United States’ continued participation in the organization, leaving merchants wondering about parcel shipping rates heading into peak season. Consolidators are making contingency plans.
In order for blockchain to succeed on a global scale in the transportation of goods, an open source standard will be required, according to a FedEx executive who heads up a blockchain alliance working toward that goal. The first standard of the Blockchain in Transport Alliance, on shipment location tracking, was published in March.
In a bold and unexpected move, Stamps.com, which built its business through an exclusive shipping partnership with the U.S. Postal Service, is now severing that relationship as it seeks to offer its ecommerce customers more options, while keeping a sharp eye on Amazon logistics. See what the CEO had to say and how analysts reacted.
Deutsche Post unit DHL Supply Chain North America is investing $300 million to increase the level of automation and robotics at 350 of its 430 facilities, to better handle the crush of ecommerce orders. DHL also plans to open a 24,000-square-foot innovation center near Chicago in September 2019.
The USPS is proposing a number of rate changes that would be effective on Jan. 27 including an average 9.3% increase in its Parcel Select service for packages weighing more than 1 lb., as it looks to recover rising costs and deals with stiff competition from major carriers.
A year after a quiet introduction, Amazon is expanding Hub by Amazon, secure keypad-access lockers in high-rise and garden apartments that allow shoppers to grab packages at their convenience. Interestingly, the service is available to other shippers as well as Amazon itself.
Going head-to-head with UPS and FedEx, which have owned the domestic space, DHL eCommerce, an arm of German logistics giant DHL, is launching a same-day delivery service in eight U.S. cities that some believe will have Amazon as a major client.
Continuing its push into cross-border ecommerce to take advantage of rapid growth in that area, FedEx is consolidating a few different business units under existing freight forwarding division FedEx Trade Networks (FTN) as of March 1. See what FTN is now comprised of, and how FedEx views the opportunity.