On Wednesday, September 12, 2018 FedEx announced that it will begin six-day a week delivery in order to meet growing demand. Its biggest competitors, UPS and USPS, already offer delivery six or seven days a week.
The move to an increased delivery schedule is due, for the most part, to the growth in ecommerce. FedEx wants to be well-prepared for the upcoming peak season and has already predicted another record-breaker.
FedEx currently delivers Tuesday through Saturday but will add Monday to the schedule. Bob Henning, FedEx’s Ground chief officer stated: “The growth of ecommerce has caused us to assess Monday deliveries, and we’ve concluded that this is the right moment for us to move into a six-day configuration.” While FedEx usually expands its delivery schedule during the peak season, the company will now keep the six days of delivery permanently.
In order to do this, the company will increase the hours of some of its employees, in addition to hiring an additional 55,000 workers for the holiday season. The major carrier has also been investing in new facilities and technologies to be able to handle the increasing demand. For example, 15 new hubs with updated handling systems and advanced robotics and real-time route planning have added to the expansion plans. This multi-fold expanded capacity will enable the company to grow with the demand as well as increase efficiencies.
FedEx does not expect the demand to slow, noting that 2018 will be a record volume year for the company. For example, a record delivery day was 12 million shipments in 2009, and now the carrier handles more than 14 million shipments on a typical day. Shippers take note, however, the additional demand which necessitated the addition of a delivery day could bring higher rate increases for 2019.