Expanded FedEx terminal in area is 'gateway to Canada'

When FedEx Ground completes a 40 percent expansion of its Buffalo distribution hub this month, it will be able to deliver an additional 2,000 packages a day.
The expansion is needed because people are buying more on the Internet, and FedEx is servicing a booming population across the border.

The Walden Avenue project is part of a USD 1.6 billion investment to expand 30 existing FedEx Ground distribution hubs and build nine new ones across the country.

A growing group of online shoppers is driving ground delivery companies to expand their operations.

Forrester Research predicts that by 2008, e-commerce in the U.S. will grow by 19 percent and online shopping will make up 10 percent of all retail sales.
“It certainly has had a profound impact on the ground delivery industry,” said John Cameron, executive vice president of ground products and services for DHL Express USA.

For delivery companies, this means more packages going to homes. And supporting that demand means expanding facilities.

DHL is wrapping up a USD 1.2 billion project to expand and create new distribution hubs, which will increase ground delivery capacity by 60 percent.
The United Parcel Service recently poured USD 1 billion into expanding a Kentucky air facility, which services its ground delivery business.

FedEx hopes its Buffalo sorting facility will become a gateway into Canada, where a booming Toronto economy is keeping its trucks full of packages. “The Internet has no borders,” said Bram Johnson, executive vice president for FedEx Ground. “We’re trying to align the physical border with the virtual border.”
When the 25,000-square-foot expansion is completed, the FedEx facility will be able to handle an additional 20 vans (68 total), which will deliver 13,000 packages to businesses in a 50-mile radius.

It will also be able to receive 25,000 packages from tractor trailers driving in from Canadian and U.S. cities at night.

“The international border is growing by leaps and bounds,” said Jesse Walczak, senior manager of the FedEx Ground Buffalo station.

Rick More has seen the impact of Internet sales on his FedEx delivery route.
A few years ago, More would drop off less than a dozen residential packages a day over six zip codes in between his business stops. Now, he makes over 30 stops in just four zip codes.

And that doesn’t take into account the FedEx home delivery driver, who drops off more than 100 packages a day in More’s area.

Currently there are 200 employees and contractors working out of the Buffalo facility. FedEx Ground didn’t say how many more workers the facility would accommodate after the expansion.

By 2010, the company hopes to increase its total package capacity from 3 million to 5 million a day.

“I think they’re finding in this industry they can’t rest on their laurels and expect to maintain their position in the market,” said Andrew Lambert, communications program manager for Unishippers Association, a reseller of shipping services. “They recognize they need to keep moving forward.”