Amazon’s ‘Christmas Creep’ Poses Stress Test for FedEx, UPS - MSN
FedEx Corp. and United Parcel Service Inc. are girding for their biggest test yet in the e-commerce era, with “Christmas Creep” pushing the holiday shopping season ever earlier and stretching the limits of shipping networks already strained by the Covid-19 pandemic.
Promotions by Amazon.com Inc. and rivals that began Tuesday are forecast to spur $10 billion in sales, accelerating holiday purchases and outstripping last year’s post-Thanksgiving Cyber Monday spree. With legions of consumers staying away from stores this year, the parcel carriers are already handling record deliveries and bumping against capacity constraints.
“Prime Day will be a very good test,” said John Haber, founder of logistics consulting firm Spend Management Experts. “If they can handle all the packages coming out of the gate here and do that smoothly, that’s a good sign of things to come. If they have problems, those problems probably won’t go away.”
FedEx Corp. and United Parcel Service Inc. are girding for their biggest test yet in the e-commerce era, with “Christmas Creep” pushing the holiday shopping season ever earlier and stretching the limits of shipping networks already strained by the Covid-19 pandemic.
Promotions by Amazon.com Inc. and rivals that began Tuesday are forecast to spur $10 billion in sales, accelerating holiday purchases and outstripping last year’s post-Thanksgiving Cyber Monday spree. With legions of consumers staying away from stores this year, the parcel carriers are already handling record deliveries and bumping against capacity constraints.
“Prime Day will be a very good test,” said John Haber, founder of logistics consulting firm Spend Management Experts. “If they can handle all the packages coming out of the gate here and do that smoothly, that’s a good sign of things to come. If they have problems, those problems probably won’t go away.”
