Amazon is opening its partial-truckload freight service to shipments bound for “any type of destination,” the company announced Wednesday, including other companies’ warehouses, distribution centers and retail partners.
The e-commerce and technology giant’s supply chain platform — itself launched just last month — said that the expanded “less-than-truckload” service would enable customers to reserve space for their pallets in Amazon’s trucks among shipments for other companies. Amazon began offering less-than-truckload shipments to its own fulfillment centers earlier this spring.
"The feedback from Amazon selling partners using our LTL service was clear: the technology, visibility and reliability were exactly what they needed, and they wanted to use it more broadly," Jim Ruiz, the director of Amazon Freight, said in a statement. "Now, Amazon LTL can move your freight wherever it needs to go, servicing destinations nationwide for businesses of all sizes.”
The logistics network, developed and used by Amazon, currently includes more than 80,000 trailers, 24,000 intermodal containers and terminals in major U.S. metro areas. Amazon officials said the service will offer same-day pickup through its drop trailer solution, along with next-day live pickup for orders placed by 5 p.m and standing daily pickups for shippers considered “high-volume.”
