Amazon Surpasses UPS to Become Largest Delivery Service in US

 Amazon has reportedly surpassed UPS to become America’s largest delivery business.

The eCommerce behemoth delivered more packages to consumers in the U.S. last year than UPS — and also has led FedEx since 2020 — and is on target to widen that gap even further, the Wall Street Journal reported Monday (Nov. 27).

The report, which cited internal Amazon data and sources familiar with the matter, noted that the U.S Postal Service remains the largest parcel service in terms of volume, carrying hundreds of millions of packages for Amazon, FedEx and UPS.

By Thanksgiving of this year, Amazon had delivered more than 4.8 billion packages in the U.S., the report said, with the company forecasting it would reach 5.9 billion by year’s end, up from 5.2 billion in 2022. However, the report said Amazon’s milestone was greeted without much fanfare inside the company.

“There’s not a lot of perceived value in chest thumping on being the biggest,” said a former senior Amazon logistics executive about the milestone. Instead of a celebration marking the jump on the leaderboard, Amazon executives high-fived and got back to work, one recalled. 

Still, the report frames Amazon’s rise to the top as something of a vindication, as other logistics companies once scoffed at the notion of the company becoming a threat.

“In all likelihood, the primary deliverers of eCommerce shipments for the foreseeable future will be UPS, the U.S. Postal Service and FedEx,” former FedEx CEO Fred Smith said in 2016.

Seven years later, both FedEx and UPS were offering discounts to woo customers in the face of a weaker holiday shipping season, as covered here in October, as choppers reduce spending on consumer goods.

Meanwhile, PYMNTS last week examined Amazon’s rival Walmart’s use of parcel stations in its stores to function as delivery hubs.

The retail giant says it plans to have more than 40 parcel stations operational in stores by the year’s end, with many in service for the holiday season. Walmart aims to extend this capability to more locations in 2024.

These stations function “like a mini post office that receives and delivers packages,” said Jennifer McKeehan, senior vice president of transportation and delivery at Walmart U.S.

In its earnings call earlier this month, Walmart reported that in-store fulfilled pickup and delivery contributed to a 24% surge in eCommerce in the third quarter.