UPS will begin picking up and delivering packages seven days a week starting in 2020, and it will add more than 10,000 new stores to its network of package pickup locations.
Sandy Springs-based UPS said it is expanding its Saturday pick-up and delivery for residential and business locations and adding Sunday pick-up and delivery options, with the seven-day-a-week service starting Jan. 1.
The company detailed its plans while reporting record profits for the second quarter of 2019, with nearly $1.7 billion in net income, up 13.5 percent. That includes domestic growth led by a more than 30 percent increase in Next Day Air volume, driven by faster delivery requirements from e-commerce shippers.
“Demand for faster delivery is a structural change in our industry,” UPS CEO David Abney said in a written statement. He said large e-commerce shippers are shifting from competitors’ two-day delivery options to UPS one-day service.
Competitor FedEx Ground in May announced year-round seven-day residential delivery.
UPS said it will offer its seven-day operation by combining its own delivery network with its UPS Access Point retail partner locations and its SurePost partnership with the U.S. Postal Service.
The company's latest union contract created a new classification for drivers handling weekend shifts to help handle the surge in demand for deliveries from online shopping.
And the postal service has “the potential for a Sunday capacity that matches a Wednesday’s capacity,” said UPS chief strategy and transformation officer Scott Price. “Overall, that’s really where the market’s going…. A Sunday will start to feel like a Wednesday.”
UPS also said it will expand its network of Access Points that allow customers to pick up or drop off packages at retail store partners, by adding Michaels, CVS Pharmacy and Advance Auto Parts stores for an additional 12,000 locations.
UPS said soon, more than 90 percent of U.S. consumers will have an Access Point location within five miles of their homes.
The company is also looking to drones to augment its delivery network, announcing this week that it has applied for Federal Aviation Administration certification for a drone delivery service through a subsidiary called UPS Flight Forward Inc. UPS said it expects to get FAA Part 135 certification, often used by charter operators, this fall.
The company plans to initially use the drone subsidiary to expand recently-launched medical campus drone deliveries, to more hospital, clinic and healthcare education facilities. But that could be expanded, Price said.
