UPS and FedEx Handle Record Holiday Surge With Minimal Delays
- UPS manages to reverse earlier troubles, survey shows
- Couriers now shift seasonal focus to returned packages
Employees sort packages at the UPS Chicago Area Consolidation Hub in Hodgkins, Illinois, on Dec. 5.
Photographer: Daniel Acker/BloombergThis article is for subscribers only.
United Parcel Service Inc. and FedEx Corp. delivered almost all of people’s presents by Christmas Day, with the former company finishing strong after a bruising late November.
Early figures signal that this holiday season is shaping up as among the most challenging for the package-delivery giants, with Cyber Monday sales alone jumping 16.8 percent to $6.6 billion, according to Adobe Analytics. The volume overwhelmed UPS in the week following Black Friday, and the Atlanta-based company responded by extending the workweek for some employees and redeploying office workers to help load trucks or deliver packages.