Shipping

Cross-border shipping rates will go up for many U.S. shippers on July 1. This change comes after countries began to self-declare postal rates based on the deal reached by the Universal Postal Union (UPU) in September, Supply Chain Dive reported. Many postage sellers, consolidators and other cross-border service providers such as FedEx, UPS and Stamps.com, received new contracts from…

Less than two weeks after United Parcel Service (UPS) posted surcharges on all types of deliveries, FedEx Corp. has followed suit. In an announcement posted on its website last week, FedEx said it's imposing a temporary surcharge, effective today, June 8, on certain types of packages as shipping carriers struggle with the surge related to e-commerce orders due…

UPS announced two Peak Surcharge increases effective May 31, 2020: an increase on UPS Ground Residential and UPS SurePost packages, as well as an add-on charge for larger shipments that incur the Large Package Surcharge (LPS). Ground Residential as well as SurePost will be assessed an additional surcharge of $.30/package when the current average weekly…

Whether you're a Fortune 500 retailer or an emerging direct-to-consumer (D-to-C) brand, your customers expect ease and convenience when ordering online. The problem is, meeting these expectations can put a significant strain on your business. Traditional logistics networks weren’t designed for D-to-C fulfillment because they were built to get goods onto store shelves. To meet…

In the last installment of this 10-part series, I focus on emerging technologies and trends that will shape fulfillment in the coming months and years. These innovations enable merchants to fulfill orders faster while reducing costs, especially in the last mile and warehouse operations. Many large e-commerce merchants have started to adopt these technologies, and…

The 21st century has brought about major changes and advancements for e-commerce, defining its first phase. “E-commerce 1.0” ushered in off-the-shelf solutions that automated transactions and fulfillment for a number of goods. The meteoric rise of multinational giants like FedEx, UPS, Amazon.com, and Stripe have made buying and receiving shipments a breeze for the average…

In the past four months, we’ve covered nearly 50 unique strategies for making free shipping profitable, from pricing mechanisms and outsourcing to managing returns. In part nine of this series, we’ll focus on tweaks you can make in your operations to optimize your costs further. (Here are parts one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, and eight of this series.) 1. Downsize your…

Target announced last week that it's in the process of acquiring technology from Deliv, a startup that focuses on last-mile batched delivery. Target is acquiring the technology so it can explore new ways to deliver online orders more quickly while also lowering its shipping costs, according to a May 7 blog post on Target's corporate site. Target…

As the COVID-19 outbreak continues to sweep across the globe and leave chaos in its wake, there's a realization from everyone that the disruption isn't ending any time soon. For retailers, there have never been tougher climates to trade in — physical stores have been closed, consumer confidence is low, and peoples are spending less…

Here are the latest stories to emerge as retailers and brands deal with the impact that the global spread of the coronavirus has had on their businesses. This daily update offers retail executives the chance to stay-up-to-date on all that's happening within the retail industry, particularly as they put into motion their own COVID-19 response…