Amazon Freight Enters the LTL Category

Amazon Supply Chain Services announces new less-than-truckload shipping service for all businesses of any size to any type of destination.

Last week, Lighting News Now reported on changes to FedEx Freight that could affect less-than-truckload (LTL) shipping that showrooms and small manufacturers use in their business.

Now Amazon Freight is stepping up to the plate in the LTL market. Manufacturers and suppliers that are already using Amazon Freight to move full truckloads now have option for smaller loads.

On June 10, Amazon announced that its LTL service, which includes palletized shipments, is officially open for all businesses to any type of destination.

“We kept hearing the same thing from shippers, ‘I need LTL that performs like my full truckload service,’” said Jim Ruiz, director at Amazon Freight. “That’s a high bar, and it’s exactly the one we set for ourselves. This launch is our answer to that challenge and built on the same operational backbone that moves Amazon shipments.”

When Amazon launched inbound LTL last year, it was built for smaller shippers moving loads into Amazon fulfillment centers. Now, as part of Amazon Supply Chain Services, more options have opened up.

According to a company statement from Amazon, “Whether you’re a budding business or a large enterprise, you can tap into Amazon’s logistics network for your LTL freight the same way thousands of shippers already do for FTL. This includes shipping to your own warehouses, distribution centers, and retail locations, as well as Amazon fulfillment centers.”

Noted business customer Zech Hintz, vice president of Global Supply Chain at Pattern, “We’ve worked with Amazon Freight on the truckload side for over four years, so when they launched LTL, adding it was an easy decision. Having flexibility for both truckload and LTL through a single provider in Amazon Freight has simplified our operations in ways we didn’t expect.”

Businesses can start receiving quotes for LTL loads immediately by creating an account in the Amazon Freight portal. Amazon Freight maintains terminals across the country and has a fleet of 80,000+ trailers.

Qualified shippers get access to a unified, multi-modal drop trailer pool shared across both FTL and LTL. That means when the Amazon trailer pulls up, a company’s warehouse crew doesn’t have to waste time sorting through which ones are for FTL and which ones are for LTL before they are loaded.

According to Amazon Freight, its LTL service delivers real-time tracking through EDI integrations and a web portal, with pallet-specific milestone events including terminal arrival and departure updates.

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