E-Commerce Driving Double Holiday Volume at FedEx From 8 Years Ago

A “record number” of holiday shipments, “fueled largely by the steady rise of e-commerce, are flowing through the FedEx global networks,” Chairman Fred Smith said on a Wednesday earnings call. Just this past Monday, FedEx picked up more than 26 million packages globally, Smith said. “It's no secret that e-commerce is changing the dynamics of the transportation industry and driving remarkable growth.” Due to the rise of e-commerce, on its “busiest days” this holiday selling season, FedEx on average is doing “approximately double” the volume it did eight years ago, said Mike Glenn, CEO of FedEx Services. A “big part” of e-commerce is “handling returns,” Smith said in Q&A. “So some years ago, as we saw the market evolving, we decided it would be a very, very good thing for us to have a supply chain capability to offer a broader portfolio of value-added services to our e-commerce customers, because this was a huge part of the marketplace,” Smith said. “It wasn't just planning on how to get it to the end customer, but how to efficiently process the returns and merchandise.”