Dive Brief:
- Amazon Supply Chain Services is expanding its less-than-truckload freight offering, allowing shippers to utlize the service when transporting LTL goods to any destination, not just the e-commerce giant’s own facilities, according to a Wednesday announcement.
- The shift means freight can arrive at places such as third-party warehouses, distribution centers and retail partners.
- “Now Amazon LTL can move your freight wherever it needs to go, servicing destinations nationwide for businesses of all sizes,” Jim Ruiz, director of Amazon Freight, said in the release.
Dive Insight:
Amazon’s continued expansion of its supply chain offerings comes from a playbook found in its truckload services.
The e-commerce giant’s Amazon Freight division spans multiple modes, including truckload, which already offers shipping to third-party destinations. The option was previously unavailable for LTL shipments.
“We kept hearing the same thing from shippers: ‘I need LTL that performs like my full truckload service,’” Ruiz said in another release.
Amazon’s LTL services, which moved millions of pallets within its network in the U.S. last year, will now apply to “any volume, where it needs to go,” Amazon SVP of Worldwide Operations Udit Madan said in a LinkedIn post about the shift.
The LTL service expansion comes the month after Amazon opened its supply chain network to all shippers, not just Amazon customers. That change has allowed businesses to tap into 80,000-plus trailers, 24,000-plus intermodal containers and 100-plus aircraft along with distribution, warehousing and fulfillment services.
The extensions further build off previous pushes by Amazon into the trucking industry. For example, the company launched a load board in 2018 after the development of a warehouse check-in app called Amazon Relay in 2017. Amazon also began offering LTL services in 2019.
