USPS to expand Amazon grocery delivery trial to NYC
The US Postal Service has told its regulator it is preparing to expand its early-morning grocery deliveries service for Amazon to the New York metropolitan area. USPS gave notice to the Postal Regulatory Commission last week to state that it will expand the Customized Delivery trial “on or shortly after” 29 June.
The service has been running as a market test in San Francisco since last August, as part of a planned two-year trial period.
Branded “AmazonFresh”, the service in 38 zip code areas of the Northern California city has involved groceries including chilled and frozen items being dropped off at USPS destination delivery units between 1.30am and 2.30am. Items are then delivered to customer doorsteps between 3am and 7am in Amazon-branded bags.
Amazon sends the Postal Service address information and QR codes for each bag being delivered to allow USPS to organise its delivery routes for the service, with each bag being scanned by delivery staff to confirm delivery completion.
The Postal Service sees the “experimental” package delivery service as another way to generate income from its existing infrastructure, taking advantage of its reach among US households.
The regulator limited the Postal Service to raising $10m in revenue through the market test, unless USPS could provide additional financial details on the operations to estimate revenues for the service.
Thursday’s filing with the Commission by the Postal Service did not seek to increase the revenue restriction.
Plans authorized by the Commission last October said that the Postal Service was developing a scalable solution that could expand to other major metropolitan markets across the US in the long-term.
