4 ms·

I’d like to see an analysis of how close a carrier needs to be to feasibly do the last mile delivery. How far is the typical Fedex delivery from its points-of-p

I’d like to see an analysis of how close a carrier needs to be to feasibly do the last mile delivery. How far is the typical Fedex delivery from its points-of-presence? How many POP’s does Fedex have? How many people are within reasonable last-mile distance of an Amazon POP?

michaelt 12y ago
It depends on how close together your customers are. Let's say a driver makes $15/hour working an 8 hour shift, and Amazon's driver salary budget is $0.50 per parcel. Over the course of an 8 hour shift you need to deliver 240 parcels. You can do that by making a delivery every 2 minutes, starting right at the depot - or by driving 2 hours, making a delivery every 1 minute for 4 hours, then driving 2 hours back to the depot. Or by driving 3 hours, making a delivery every 30 seconds for 2 hours, and driving 3 hours back.
- cpwright 12y ago
  The average UPS driver is 120 deliveries per day. http://www.wired.com/2013/06/ups-astronomical-math/ http://www.wired.com/2013/06/ups-astronomical-math/ My mailman said he does something like 250 houses + a medical office complex. I expect getting up to the scale/density of UPS or USPS is going to be quite difficult.
saosebastiao 12y ago
I won't comment on Amazon for NDA reasons, but in terms of feasibility of the last mile, the answer is "it depends". Sorry to disappoint you. The following factors can have orders-of-magnitude effects on the costs of the last mile. * Cycle Times (the time from route start to route finish). If you offer short cycle times, you lower your delivery density (distance between deliveries). * Market Share. The more customers you have, the higher your delivery density. * Range. The bigger the delivery area, the further you have to travel at the beginning and ends of delivery cycles. Short cycles with large ranges can add up to very large dead weight losses. * Street patterns. Street patterns can ease or severely inhibit efficient routing. In a town full of cul-de-sacs, you have almost no flexibility to optimize your routing. In a pure grid, you can optimize extremely well. * Vehicle requirements. Smaller vehicles are extremely nimble, aren't subject to the same traffic considerations, and don't have problems with parking, ingress, or egress. Larger vehicles can be much more difficult to move around. This is actually a huge benefit to companies like Taobao, and pizza delivery, because they can use motorcycles effectively. Refrigerator Delivery, not so much. And to compound that, labor and fuel costs are a multiplier for the factors mentioned.
- pinkyand 12y ago
  What about deploying parcel lockers ? is it just not perceived as comfortable enough by people ? or the economics aren't that good ?

michaelt 12y ago

It depends on how close together your customers are. Let's say a driver makes $15/hour working an 8 hour shift, and Amazon's driver salary budget is $0.50 per parcel. Over the course of an 8 hour shift you need to deliver 240 parcels. You can do that by making a delivery every 2 minutes, starting right at the depot - or by driving 2 hours, making a delivery every 1 minute for 4 hours, then driving 2 hours back to the depot. Or by driving 3 hours, making a delivery every 30 seconds for 2 hours, and driving 3 hours back.

cpwright 12y ago
The average UPS driver is 120 deliveries per day. http://www.wired.com/2013/06/ups-astronomical-math/ http://www.wired.com/2013/06/ups-astronomical-math/ My mailman said he does something like 250 houses + a medical office complex. I expect getting up to the scale/density of UPS or USPS is going to be quite difficult.

saosebastiao 12y ago

I won't comment on Amazon for NDA reasons, but in terms of feasibility of the last mile, the answer is "it depends". Sorry to disappoint you. The following factors can have orders-of-magnitude effects on the costs of the last mile. * Cycle Times (the time from route start to route finish). If you offer short cycle times, you lower your delivery density (distance between deliveries). * Market Share. The more customers you have, the higher your delivery density. * Range. The bigger the delivery area, the further you have to travel at the beginning and ends of delivery cycles. Short cycles with large ranges can add up to very large dead weight losses. * Street patterns. Street patterns can ease or severely inhibit efficient routing. In a town full of cul-de-sacs, you have almost no flexibility to optimize your routing. In a pure grid, you can optimize extremely well. * Vehicle requirements. Smaller vehicles are extremely nimble, aren't subject to the same traffic considerations, and don't have problems with parking, ingress, or egress. Larger vehicles can be much more difficult to move around. This is actually a huge benefit to companies like Taobao, and pizza delivery, because they can use motorcycles effectively. Refrigerator Delivery, not so much. And to compound that, labor and fuel costs are a multiplier for the factors mentioned.

pinkyand 12y ago
What about deploying parcel lockers ? is it just not perceived as comfortable enough by people ? or the economics aren't that good ?