Amazon could be the world's largest delivery company?

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Imagine clicking “buy now” from a farmhouse porch and getting the parcel the very next day. That is the promise behind Amazon’s latest bet.

The company is pouring more than $4 billion into a push across small-town America, aiming to speed up drop-offs across thirteen thousand rural ZIP codes.

If everything lands on schedule, Amazon vans could move an extra one billion parcels a year, backed by two hundred new delivery stations and one hundred thousand jobs. In volume terms it would nudge the retailer past the US Postal Service and widen the gap with private rivals.

Timing matters. UPS has just announced twenty thousand layoffs and the closure of seventy-three depots as it steps back from unprofitable Amazon work. FedEx is trimming routes too. Where others retreat, Amazon is running up the hill.

The rural focus is not charity – it is margin insurance. Prime members outside big cities churn more slowly and buy bulky items that attract higher fees. Faster delivery turns them into loyal repeat shoppers.

One takeaway: logistics is no longer a side hustle for Jeff Bezos’ empire. It is the moat. Each mile of gravel road it conquers makes the marketplace harder to match.

The new frontier in e-commerce is the back road that once ended at a lonely mailbox.

Source: Chartr

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