Page 7 - ATD 17OCT,2015
P. 7
U.S. NEWS A7
Saturday 17 October 2015
US Financial Front:
Wal-Mart, others speed up holiday deliveries to shoppers
A. D’INNOCENZIO members of its Prime loy- speedy service is to make stores to ship to customers. line rivals. Since last year,
AP Retail Writer alty program who pay $99 two-day delivery standard. The world’s largest retailer the world’s largest retailer
BETHELEHEM, Pa. (AP) — a year. But even Amazon That’s half the average for also is spending $1.2 bil- has opened five ware-
Christmas won’t come feels pressure to please standard delivery for the lion to $1.5 billion in online houses across the country
early this year, but the gifts customers who have little top 40 online retailers, ac- investments this year and in Bethlehem, Pennsylva-
might. tolerance for lengthy deliv- cording to data company $1.1 billion next year. That’s nia; Fort Worth, Texas; Plain-
Just in time for the winter ery waits. StellaService. But most are up from last year’s $1 bil- field, Indiana; and Atlanta
holiday shopping season, to handle online orders.
Amazon, Wal-Mart, Ma- Wal-Mart president and CEO Greg Foran wears a Wal-Mart workers vest as he talks with employ- Next year, Wal-Mart plans
cy’s and other retailers are ees during a gathering for a preview at a new distribution facility in Bethlehem, Pa. Just in time for to open another center in
working behind the scenes the winter holiday shopping season, Amazon, Wal-Mart, Home Depot, Macy’s and other retailers southern California, one
to make sure they can de- are working behind the scenes to make sure they can deliver online orders to shoppers’ homes in Dallas and two more in
liver online orders to shop- faster and cheaper. Florida.
pers faster. The new warehouses each
Retailers are building big- (AP Photo/Mel Evans) will ship hundreds of thou-
ger warehouses —some sands of orders daily, four to
the size of 20 football fields “I would like to plan ahead, stopping short of guaran- lion. The investments are five times its dozens of exist-
— to handle shipments. but I’ve been able to wait teeing customers faster de- squeezing profit: Wal-Mart ing smaller warehouses.
They’re also sending orders until the last minute to get liveries. stock tumbled Wednesday Each new warehouse has
to shoppers directly from things done,” said Keri Ear- Wal-Mart says it aims to get after it warned earnings several million items, five
their stores and using so- ly, a Clyde, Illinois, resident packages to shoppers who would be down as much times the network of older
phisticated software that who orders from Amazon get standard shipping with- as 12 percent next year in warehouses. That will en-
tells them the quickest, frequently. in two days for a majority of part because of its heavy able Wal-Mart to offer
cheapest way to get or- For many retailers, the goal the U.S. this holiday season. spending on e-commerce. more consolidated orders
ders shipped. And Amazon to meet the demands The retailer now uses 83 Still, Wal-Mart is spending to arriving in fewer boxes.
is cutting the time it takes of shoppers like Early for of its more than 4,500 U.S. stay competitive with on- “This is going to allow us to
to process an order from be more efficient, to do it
hours to minutes by using faster, to do it cheaper and
robots to pull items for ship- be more accurate with the
ment in its warehouses. orders, which is important
It’s a race for time by retail- with the customers,” said
ers as more people shop Greg Foran, CEO of Wal-
online. U.S. online sales are Mart’s U.S. business.
expected to increase 12 One of Wal-Mart’s two
percent to $371 billion this Bethlehem warehouses
year, accounting for 10 per- opened in July and is con-
cent of overall retail sales, sidered the retailer’s crown
says Forrester Research. But jewel. It has two towers with
as online shopping grows, four stories of the fastest
so does the impatience of moving items of the sea-
shoppers who want their or- son that can be retrieved
ders fast. through a computerized
Traditional brick-and-mor- chute. For example, for
tar stores are trying to catch the holidays, that would in-
up to Amazon.com, which clude iPads and swimsuits
set the standard for speed for the summer.q
with its two-day delivery for
