FedEx battles through record package shipping day

FedEx is expecting to deliver 19m packages today on what it believes will be its busiest day in company history. The Memphis-based integrator has 300,000 staff supported by 20,000 seasonal personnel today, handling more than 200 packages per second.

Increased online shopping activity is directly fueling a 10% year-on-year increase in volumes, the company said.

Most of these Internet purchases will be delivered via the FedEx Ground and FedEx SmartPost networks, the latter in partnership with the US Postal Service.

FedEx cited market research firm eMarketer in suggesting that online holiday sales are set to climb 17% this year compared to the same festive period in 2011.

Today alone – what eBay describes as “Green Monday” because it is the biggest shopping day of the year – US consumers are predicted to spend $1.1bn online.

Michael Glenn, the FedEx executive vice president of Market Development, said his company had been preparing for almost a year for its peak season.

“The spirit and drive of our team members, backed by the efficiency of our networks, will help us delivered what we expect will be a record-breaking 280m packages through our global networks between Thanksgiving and Christmas,” he said.

Last year FedEx had a peak of 17.2m shipments on its busiest day, 12th December. Its peak has grown each year since recording a 9.8m-item peak in 2005.

This year, Fedex has more than 90,000 vehicles and 660 aircraft deployed to handle the flood of packages, along with more than 660 FedEx Express and 520 Fedex Ground facilities in the United States and its World Hub in Memphis sorting 500,000 packages each hour.

FedEx said last minute shoppers still have “plenty of time” to get their shopping done, with the deadline for pre-Christmas delivery in the US set as 17th December for FedEx Ground and 22nd December for FedEx Express delivery.