Amazon will strive a brand new twist on native deliveries at a shuttered website in Seattle’s Ballard neighborhood: a retail-style supply hub for speedy dispatch of Amazon Flex drivers.
Allow filings describe it as a retailer wherein no prospects will ever set foot. As an alternative, Amazon workers will fulfill on-line orders — choosing and bagging gadgets in a back-of-house stockroom, inserting the finished orders on cabinets on the entrance of the house, and handing them off to Amazon Flex drivers for speedy supply within the surrounding neighborhood.
The paperwork define a steady stream wherein drivers arrive, scan in, retrieve a packaged buyer order, verify it with an affiliate, and depart inside roughly two minutes. The operation is predicted to run 24 hours a day, seven days per week.
It’s going to function “very similar to a comfort retailer,” Amazon says in a single submitting.
The plans for the previous Amazon Recent Pickup website, at 5100 fifteenth Ave. NW, haven’t been beforehand reported. The venture makes use of the code “ZST4,” with the “Z” designation representing a brand new class of Amazon website that aligns with the just lately launched “Amazon Now” supply kind — quick, sub-one-hour supply blocks from devoted pickup places.
Current screenshots shared by Amazon Flex drivers on Fb present Amazon Now at equally named websites, reminiscent of ZST3 in Seattle’s College District and ZPL3 in Philadelphia, suggesting the Ballard venture is a part of a broader rollout of small, hyperlocal supply operations.
It’s a part of Amazon’s bigger push into “sub-same-day” supply — wherein smaller, city success facilities carry a restricted set of high-demand gadgets for quicker turnaround. The corporate has been attempting completely different approaches on this realm for a number of years, in search of the precise mixture of logistics and economics.
Amazon is way from alone in exploring new fashions for ultrafast supply. GoPuff, DoorDash, Uber Eats, Glovo, FreshDirect and others all function variations of quick-commerce or micro-fulfillment networks, typically utilizing partnerships or “darkish shops” — retail-style storefronts which can be closed to the general public and used solely to meet on-line orders at excessive velocity.
Amazon’s Flex program launched 10 years in the past. Flex drivers are impartial contractors who ship packages utilizing their very own automobiles, signing up for supply blocks by the Amazon Flex app. This system has typically been described as Uber for bundle supply.
What’s completely different in regards to the new Seattle website, and the Amazon Now initiative, is the velocity and ease of the operation. As described within the filings. it emphasizes speedy handoffs, with drivers biking by in minutes moderately than loading up for longer supply routes.
The allow filings emphasize that some supply drivers will use private e-bikes and scooters to make deliveries, reflecting the smaller dimension of the orders and the quick distances concerned.
Testing the economics
Provide-chain analyst Marc Wulfraat of MWPVL Worldwide, who tracks Amazon’s logistics community, mentioned the method is much like its legacy Prime Now and Amazon Recent native supply websites, with the twist of working extra like a retailer than a warehouse, based mostly on Amazon’s description.
He mentioned that might imply Amazon will inventory perishable gadgets in cooler shows along with shelf-stable items. (That might align with Amazon’s latest effort to combine recent groceries immediately into Amazon.com orders, letting prospects add produce and different chilled gadgets to straightforward same-day deliveries.)
The submitting doesn’t element the kinds of merchandise to be accessible from the positioning, besides that they are going to be “important gadgets and native merchandise which can be in-demand and hyper-focused on the wants of native prospects inside the neighborhood.”
“I are likely to view these as lab experiments to check if the idea is worthwhile,” Wulfraat mentioned.
The problem with these small-format websites, he defined, is that every order tends to be low-value, which suggests the mixed value of fulfilling and delivering it might probably take up a big share of the income — elevating questions on whether or not the mannequin may be worthwhile.
Amazon has experimented with comparable concepts earlier than.
In late 2024, the corporate shut down “Amazon As we speak,” a same-day supply program that used Flex drivers to choose up small orders from mall and brick-and-mortar retailers. CNBC reported on the time that the service struggled as a result of drivers typically left the shops with just one or two gadgets, making the associated fee per supply far greater than conventional warehouse-based routes.
That pullback illustrated the financial challenges of ultrafast supply and smaller orders. However by working the brand new Seattle “retailer” itself, the corporate ought to be capable to management extra of the variables, together with stock stream, pickup effectivity, and the labor required within the course of.
Beneath the plan, the brand new Ballard hub shall be staffed by 4 shifts of six to eight Amazon workers every — which interprets into 24 to 32 workers per day. The location is predicted to dispatch about 240 automobiles over a 24-hour interval, with peak volumes of 15 to twenty journeys per hour.
It is going to be the second time for this constructing to host an Amazon retail experiment. The location beforehand operated as one in every of solely two standalone Amazon Recent Pickup places within the U.S., providing drive-up grocery retrieval and bundle returns for Prime members starting in 2017.
Amazon closed the Ballard pickup website in early 2023 amid a broader pullback from a number of brick-and-mortar initiatives, shifting focus to different Amazon Recent shops, Complete Meals, and on-line grocery supply. The constructing has been closed since then.
Becoming into the zoning
The emphasis on the retail-style nature of the brand new Seattle supply hub might additionally serve one other objective: serving to guarantee the power suits inside its retail-focused zoning designation.
The location is zoned for auto-oriented retail and repair companies, and permitted as a retail retailer for basic gross sales and companies, a classification Amazon secured in 2016 when changing the constructing from a restaurant. (It was beforehand the longtime location of Louie’s Delicacies of China.)
If town agrees the brand new use qualifies as retail, Amazon might keep away from a proper change-of-use assessment — a course of that may set off further scrutiny, together with up to date site visitors assessments, environmental checks, and necessities to carry older buildings as much as present codes.
Amazon’s allow submitting repeatedly makes use of retail terminology and describes Flex drivers as proxies for patrons: “Our retailer can have a small front-of-house space the place buyer chosen merchandise can be found for buyer representatives (Amazon Flex Drivers) to come back in to choose up the bought merchandise,” reads a story included within the filings, dated Oct. 31.
The method might additionally double as a template for areas of the nation the place officers are cracking down on “darkish shops” in retail corridors. Cities together with New York, Amsterdam, and Paris have moved to manage or ban micro-fulfillment facilities from storefronts, arguing that they make city cores much less energetic and violate zoning codes.
There’s no phrase but on Amazon’s timeline for opening the brand new facility. We’ve contacted the corporate for touch upon the venture and we’ll replace this put up with any further particulars.
[Thanks to the anonymous tipster who let us know to look for the filing. If you have newsworthy information to share on any topic we cover, email tips@geekwire.com or use our online form.]
