Competition Heats Up: FedEx Announces 7-Day Residential Delivery
Ensuring that it can match the constant demands of eCommece, on May 30, FedEx Corp. announced that its Ground division will deliver seven days per week during the holiday peak season beginning in 2020. This service will continue year-round for the majority of the U.S. population. The company is also rapidly integrating FedEx SmartPost package volume into FedEx Ground standard operations and increasing large package capabilities.
“We have made significant investments in capacity, technology and automation at FedEx Ground over the past 20 years," says Raj Subramaniam, CEO, FedEx Corp. "These investments have allowed us to gain ground market share for 19 of the last 20 years, and we are now ideally positioned to extend that growth as the average daily volume for small parcels in the U.S. is expected to double by 2026. Expanding our operations to include Sunday residential deliveries further increases our ability to meet the demands of e-commerce shippers and online shoppers.”
In addition to delivering every day of the week, FedEx Ground is making changes to enhance its efficiency in last-mile deliveries. Nearly two million FedEx SmartPost packages that were previously given to the U.S. Postal Service for delivery to homes every day will be increasingly integrated into FedEx Ground operations and delivered by the same service providers currently handling FedEx Ground residential packages.
“Delivery density has consistently been a challenge with e-commerce,” Subramaniam says. “We anticipate substantial density improvement and efficiency opportunities when all residential packages are sorted and delivered within the same ground network.”
Since 2016, state-of-the-art technology has enabled the movement of a FedEx SmartPost package into the FedEx Ground network when another package is destined to the same or nearby address. This has resulted in the integration of approximately 20% of FedEx SmartPost packages to date. Starting this fall, the integration of these packages will be significantly accelerated, and the vast majority of FedEx SmartPost package volume is expected to be integrated into FedEx Ground operations for final delivery by the end of 2020.
FedEx also is addressing how to ship larger items. Online shopping has quickly evolved to include oversized and heavy items such as TVs, furniture, rugs, mattresses and auto parts. These large packages now comprise more than 10% of the company's Ground’s volume, and the growth is expected to continue. The company is making significant operational changes to ensure safe and reliable handling of these large items. These changes include designing new facilities, adding equipment to existing facilities and making other operational adjustments.
“These transformational steps demonstrate how the size, scope and technology of the FedEx network enable us to be nimble and responsive to the changing needs of e-commerce,” Subramaniam says.
