Starting July 8, Amazon announced that it will expand its same-day and second-day delivery to more rural areas. This investment means more connections and work to thousands of American communities, as well as other threats to local businesses.
The $4 billion project will triple the business giant’s delivery network and include building hybrid delivery facilities for 4,000 communities. According to Amazon, these facilities will achieve multiple purposes and reduce transportation distances. The company hopes to complete the project by the end of this year.
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The new “hybrid hub” will overhaul and expand existing rural delivery stations, allowing storage of inventory and ready delivery. In addition to physical upgrades, Amazon will also start implementing machine learning to “predict which projects will resonate with local quality members based on their unique needs” and therefore stock accordingly.
“This expansion is beyond speed. This is to change the daily life of rural customers who are often further away from brick-and-mortar retailers, with fewer product and brand choices and limited delivery options when shopping online,” an Amazon official wrote in a blog post.
In the past, Amazon has been accused of geographically restricting its accelerated primary shipping, even for major subscribers. Last December, Washington, D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb filed a lawsuit against the company and claimed Amazon imposed a secret “delivery exclusion”, which slowed down services in selected (mostly black) communities. Amazon said that in response to previous allegations of discriminatory delivery practices, these policies are merely protection actions for areas with targeted incidents by delivery drivers.
Mixable transactions
Elsewhere, large retailers are testing new, unmanned methods to speed up the delivery process, including Walmart’s latest fleet of flying delivery drones, now flying in five states.
