Amazon is Testing its Own Delivery Service

Amazon.com is experimenting with a new delivery service for its online sellers to make more products available for two-day shipping. Bloomberg reports the new service, rumored to be titled Seller Flex, will help relieve overcrowding in its warehouses, which will push the online retailer deeper into functions handled by longtime partners UPS and FedEx. Amazon will oversee pickup of packages from warehouses of third-party merchants selling goods on its marketplace and their delivery to customers’ homes. The service, which has already been tested in India for the past two years, will be piloted first on the West Coast.

Total Retail's Take: Handling more deliveries itself will give Amazon greater control and flexibility over those last critical steps of getting products to customers’ doorsteps. Not to mention it will save Amazon money through volume discounts. Amazon has made investments before towards building its own delivery fleet — including its own cargo airline — in the process eliminating the middleman and getting deliveries to customers more quickly.