UPS Talks About its New Saturday Ground Pickup, Delivery

| Mike O'Brien

UPS recently announced it was adding Saturday pickup and delivery for its ground division, initially in 15 markets and expanding to 4,700 U.S. cities and towns by the busy holiday season, and to 5,800 locations next year. Multichannel Merchant talks with Jerome Roberts, vice president of marketing for UPS, about the rationale for the expanded service and its implications.

FedEx, UPS, FedEx Ground, FedEx Express, FedEx Smartpost, FedEx Freight, ecommerce fulfillment

FedEx Express Expands Overnight to 4,400 New Zip Codes

| MCM staff

FedEx has expanded its FedEx First Overnight service to more than 4,400 zip codes across the U.S. With this expansion, the service now reaches more than 32,000 zip codes for next-business day delivery, representing 92% of the business population in the U.S.

New FedEx Fulfillment Service Targets SMB Market

| Mike O'Brien

FedEx Supply Chain, rebranded from the company’s 2016 acquisition of Genco, is rolling out FedEx Fulfillment, a solution that provides a full suite of warehouse, inventory management and delivery services for small- to medium-sized businesses that is directly competitive with Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA).

Amazon Planning a $1.5B Air Hub in Kentucky

| Mike O'Brien

Amazon plans to build a $1.5 billion air hub at the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky airport in Hebron, KY, part of its ever-growing logistics enterprise. Observers continue to believe Amazon’s endgame is to handle shipping and distribution not only for its own fast-growing ecommerce business but for other retailers as well.

UPS Acquires UK Truck Brokerage Firm Freightex

| Mike O'Brien

UPS has acquired British firm Freightex to gain entry into the European truck brokerage market. This comes eight months after FedEx closed its acquisition of Netherlands-based TNT Express. See what a UPS unit executive had to say about the rationale behind the move, how it will be integrated with Coyote Logistics and how it’s positioned in the European market.