Amazon’s Ambition to Compete Directly with UPS and FedEx

Re:Amazon’s Ambition to Compete Directly with UPS and FedEx by elchief on Wednesday September 28, 2016 @03:01PM (#12600301)

I don't see how Amazon can do it cheaper (cost-wise)/better than UPS or Fedex, who have been optimizing for 50 years.

If they can't do it better/cheaper then the reason to do it is because UPS or Fedex are rent-seeking, and doing it themselves would bring Amazon's cost close to the actual cost of delivering

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Re:Amazon’s Ambition to Compete Directly with UPS and FedEx by mmanfrin on Wednesday September 28, 2016 @03:14PM (#12600421)

Because it's not just shipping. Shipping is the avenue for entry, but the last-mile delivery market is suitable for lots of things, like:

Amazon Fresh (groceries, which UPS/Fedex cannot do)

1 hour delivery (which UPS/Fedex cannot do without keeping their fleet at Amazon's warehouses)

Restaurant delivery

etc

The point is to capture the means of delivery so they can become the carrier for parcels/food/whatever. Uber is trying to do this too. As is Postmates. UPS/Fedex have the issue that they are very good for bulk travel, but weak at last mile (it works for them now because of the volume they do, but the best they can reasonably do is next-day).

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Re:Amazon’s Ambition to Compete Directly with UPS and FedEx by omarchowdhury on Wednesday September 28, 2016 @08:51PM (#12602559)

Seems like a merger between Amazon and either UPS or Fedex would be a wise decision, imagine that. And they don't necessarily have to pull antitrust measures afterwards, they can put their energy into effiencies instead of exploitation. And I don't think the merger would even blocked by government for antitrust concerns because they still have a lot of competition.

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Re:Amazon’s Ambition to Compete Directly with UPS and FedEx by MBCook on Wednesday September 28, 2016 @03:05PM (#12600335)

UPS/Fedex have to pick up and go anywhere.

Amazon only has to move things between their warehouses and consumers. 99% of pickups are at their warehouses. Hell if they use UPS/FedEx for returns then it's 100%.

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Re:Amazon’s Ambition to Compete Directly with UPS and FedEx by unit91 on Wednesday September 28, 2016 @03:32PM (#12600580)

Exactly. And Amazon doesn't even have to reach all of its customers. They can target high density areas, and use traditional shippers to deliver the rest.

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Re:Amazon’s Ambition to Compete Directly with UPS and FedEx by tracker1 on Wednesday September 28, 2016 @04:31PM (#12601103)

There's also the profit margins that UPS and FedEx have, which is probably not huge, but Amazon can edge those out as well.

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Re:Amazon’s Ambition to Compete Directly with UPS and FedEx by PhantomGremlin on Wednesday September 28, 2016 @04:54PM (#12601293)

I don't see how Amazon can do it cheaper (cost-wise)/better than UPS

One word: Teamsters.

UPS drivers are Teamsters. Which means they have good paying jobs with pensions and fringe benefits.

All Amazon has to do to be cheaper is to hire no-benefit minimum wage part-timers. Or even better, just use independent contractors. It's the Uberization of package delivery!

It will be far cheaper, but it won't be better.

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Re:Amazon’s Ambition to Compete Directly with UPS and FedEx by waspleg on Wednesday September 28, 2016 @06:11PM (#12601757)

^ This. And the race to the bottom continues.

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Re:Amazon’s Ambition to Compete Directly with UPS and FedEx by shambala on Wednesday September 28, 2016 @04:35PM (#12601137)

UPS and Fedex are not known for innovation. And you have to consider what level of optimization they are doing. Maybe Amazon can optimize faster/better. Even today, UPS website is dated and hard to use.

Fedex never really got Fedex Ground right.

And don't get me started on why they have to use 16 digit package tracking numbers that start with '1Z'. WTF?

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Re:Amazon’s Ambition to Compete Directly with UPS and FedEx by BinaryIdiot on Wednesday September 28, 2016 @04:01PM (#12600822)

> I don't see how Amazon can do it cheaper (cost-wise)/better than UPS or Fedex, who have been optimizing for 50 years.

Amazon is looking at hitting the low hanging fruit first. Where they can ship large amounts of times from point A to point B then have USPS or their own carriers deliver. They're not trying to compete with UPS or FedEx today. Maybe some day in the future but that's years off at best.

If they can do their own shipping for certain items to certain locations (especially if they need to move an item to another state before having UPS / FedEx / USPS ship it) they can likely save some money.

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Re:Amazon’s Ambition to Compete Directly with UPS and FedEx by petra on Wednesday September 28, 2016 @03:57PM (#12600793)

There's a startup building delivery robots for cities. Could be a god send for the last mile. What if Amazon acquired them ?

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