Amazon Closes, Abandons Plans for Dozens of US Warehouses (bloomberg.com) 72
Amazon.com, determined to reduce the size of its sprawling delivery operation amid slowing sales growth, has abandoned dozens of existing and planned facilities around the US, according to a closely watched consulting firm. From a report: MWPVL, which tracks Amazon's real-estate footprint, estimates the company has either shuttered or killed plans to open 42 facilities totaling almost 25 million square feet of usable space. The company has delayed opening an additional 21 locations, totaling nearly 28 million square feet, according to MWPVL. The e-commerce giant also has canceled a handful of European projects, mostly in Spain, the firm said.
Just this week Amazon warned officials in Maryland that it plans to close two delivery stations next month in Hanover and Essex, near Baltimore, that employ more than 300 people. The moves are a striking contrast with previous years, when the world's largest e-commerce company typically entered the fall rushing to open new facilities and hire thousands of workers to prepare for the holiday shopping season. Amazon continues to open facilities where it requires more space to meet customer demand.
Just this week Amazon warned officials in Maryland that it plans to close two delivery stations next month in Hanover and Essex, near Baltimore, that employ more than 300 people. The moves are a striking contrast with previous years, when the world's largest e-commerce company typically entered the fall rushing to open new facilities and hire thousands of workers to prepare for the holiday shopping season. Amazon continues to open facilities where it requires more space to meet customer demand.
Unions ? (Score:2)
I wonder how many of the active warehouses being closed have voted to be unionized ?
I could not get through the paywall, but I heard a day or 2 ago the deciding factor for closing some were Unions.
Re:Unions ? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: Unions ? (Score:1, Insightful)
And then you balk when we call unions legalized mobster protection rackets.
How about you set up your own warehouse, you can have it with unions and hookers and blow and find out how profitable you will be.
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Re: Unions ? (Score:5, Insightful)
I really dislike this notion of a race to the bottom being this thing we ought to avoid. No one has every claimed to hate the cheaper cars, food, computers, or other consumer goods that they've been able to purchase for less money because companies were competing to deliver the lower prices that customers actually want and vote for with their wallets.
Maybe so - but a lot of us hate the fact that these "cheaper" products are in fact made to cost less by the magic of "externalization". (Note that one component of that externalization is planned obsolescence - but everybody likes that, right? /s) I suspect that life in general probably costs more because of this, and I'm damned sure corporations make out like the bandits they truly are regardless.
It's all a shell game, with the con men becoming ever more skillful at hiding the true costs while their marks open their wallets ever wider and the rubes look on in wonder. And to a greater or lesser extent, we're ALL marks and rubes.
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How about you set up your own warehouse, you can have it with unions and hookers and blow and find out how profitable you will be.
No kidding. Only losers who have brought nothing to the table will sit there and demand more pay for doing jack shit.
I used to work in one of those "old industries" that had equipment that was installed in the early 1900s, paired with computers that were 10 years out-of-date.
The 40-or-so shitty union workers were paid between $50 and $60/hr to sit on their ass all day and push buttons.
It was more profitable to produce the product in Canada and France...so one day the company up and fired nearly all the
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Re:Unions ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, the consequences to not letting your drivers or warehouse pickers have a minute to go to the bathroom while you're making enough money to casually launch yourself in your own rocket to the edge of space was that they collectively decided to unionize.
Don't pretend like Amazon is hurting for money, and this is the worker's fault.
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The point is really that there are repercussions. I hope working conditions improve for the workers, but automation will replace many of them as labor costs (direct + indirect) increase.
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Over 150 million people in the US are Prime subscribers. As well, some people (such as myself) who can't justify a Prime subscription also buy from Amazon from time to time.
It appears likely that the majority of adults in the US think that Amazon does provide a service to them that they want to use.
You may not share their opinions and don't use Amazon for anything. However, it appears that "in general" your opinion isn't the predominate one.
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We don't -need- Amazon but they do are consumer life better.
I've bought plenty from Ali express but their search interface sucks and there's a ton of repeats of the same item from different factories and shipping delays can be brutal if they don't have your item warehoused in your country.
Amazon has a fantastic variety of items while still avoiding the Ali express clone issue, a decent search engine (not great but functional) and enough other functionality that combined makes it better than shopping other p
Re: Unions ? (Score:1)
"Allowing" - fascinating word, it says so much about you and your views on business and its relationship with government...
Re: Unions ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Corporations are a government creation that allows business owners to not be liable now a days but were originally usually only created when they would benefit society, with a corporate charter that outlined how.
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There are consequences to every action.
Though it should be noted that if they close it up JUST BECAUSE they are trying to unionize, that could be seen as retaliation, and illegal.
Re: Unions ? (Score:4, Insightful)
They simply need to demonstrate the facility is losing money, I believe. The government can't (typically) force you to keep an unprofitable business open - but you should expect the mother of all financial reviews as a result.
It's sorta like how you can fire a pregnant woman, but you better have a damn good reason and her pregnancy or anticipated maternity leave can't be the reason. You can fire her, but she'll sue and you'd better have all your ducks in a row.
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Re:Unions ? (Score:4, Insightful)
If your business can't operate profitably while offering proper wages and benefits, it doesn't deserve to exist.
Re: Unions ? (Score:2)
And now it wonâ(TM)t in those areas, offering zero jobs and zero wages. Good job unions, great job in Detroit too.
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Great! We have a worker shortage. Responsible companies will now have an easier time finding good help, and no one gets screwed by Amazon.
Sound like a win for everyone but the scummy union busters.
Re: Unions ? (Score:1)
Employers having an easier time hiring depresses wages. Amazon offers pretty good wages in comparison, not competing for the $15-20/hr bracket means more people earning less.
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No Amazon worker is complaining about wages and benefits
Where it doesn't do well, and where the complaints Amazon workers have are coming from is that they're being worked like dogs with little opportunity to break or take a breath, and with often poor management treating them unfairly or bullying staff, and in some warehouses poor health and safety resulting in high accident rates.
Yes, and they are very much saying they aren't being paid enough to put up with that. I really don't see what it is you don't understand. These issues cannot be separated from one another - the amount of BS you are willing to deal with is directly related to what someone is paying you to do so.
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Amazon seems to be offering proper wages and benefits. They managed to become the second largest private employer in the US (behind Walmart).
No one forces anyone to work at Amazon and no sane person would work for less than "proper wages and benefits" so Amazon must be offering those.
Re:Unions ? (Score:5, Insightful)
no sane person would work for less than "proper wages and benefits"
Billions of people work for less than proper wages and benefits. Get a clue.
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Re: Unions ? (Score:2)
They are choosing not to build planned facilities, no sane person is reading this as meaning Amazon is going out of business... they simply aren't expanding as fast as they did during the pandemic, for obvious reasons.
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whose idea of what is a proper wage is that? Clearly it is not a business that will not exist, it is low skill jobs at low pay that are entry level jobs that will not exist. The business will hire fewer people at a higher rate, bit for that higher rate the business will expect a more qualified applicant. Basically this will hurt inexperienced people, people with problems and disabilities and various minorities more than businesses but it will also hurt customers bu forcing prices higher.
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Businesses don't hire people out of the goodness of their heart. They hire people because they need to. The goal is always to hire the fewest number of people at the lowest possible wage to accomplish the work that needs done. If they need four people, they're going to hire four people. They're not going to hire just two people because wages are higher. If two people could do the job, then that was all they were ever going to hire.
it will also hurt customers bu forcing prices higher.
Oh, get a clue. Prices are always as high as they can possibly be. Th
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Businesses don't hire people out of the goodness of their heart. They hire people because they need to.Â
you don't say?! Really? I thought I hired 1015 people out of goodness of my heart, wow, didn't know I actually hired them because yhe business needed them for some reason. Amazing, thank you for helping me understand why I do what I do.
I hire them at the minimum rate at which they agree to work and I hire no more people than the business can AFFORD to hire them. These workers altogether cost business about 85% of total gross revenue, other expenses are approximately 5-10 percent more, depends on a month.
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thank you for helping me understand why I do what I do.
You're welcome. I'll be happy to explain basic things to you in the future. It looks like you could really use the help.
I hire them at the minimum rate at which they agree to work and I hire no more people than the business can AFFORD to hire them.
Ah, you still don't understand. Are you sure you do this for a living?
1015 people is a big expansion. What did you hire them to do? Why did you hire that many people if you weren't going to see a corresponding increase in profit afterward?
Go ahead and think about it for a minute because you obviously didn't think about it before.
These workers altogether cost business about 85% of total gross revenue
Wow, you have some serious problems. Payroll should onl
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On two occasions I have been asked, 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question.
Do you know why I quoted Charles Babbage just now? Your comment are on the same level of 'understanding', it provoked my memory to pull out this particular quote as a response to all the nonsense that you were able to string together somehow, that is why.
First of all you are obviously not familiar with the concept of sarcasm, I wasn't giving you praise, I was making fun of you.
Secondly, who are you exactly, to tell people how much of their gross revenues should go towards covering their labour costs? Yeah
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So, so, sad. As you haven't contradicted anything I've written, or even addressed the point at issue, I suppose I have no choice but to further educate you. You could really use the help. This business thing just doesn't seem to be your forte.
who are you exactly, to tell people how much of their gross revenues should go towards covering their labour costs?
This is business 101. The figure I gave you is the average for labor-intensive industries. The simple fact is that your labor costs are crazy out-of-control. This is just because I'm concerned for your well-being and has nothing to do with the point in dispute, wh
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While I am not wanting to jump into this debate as self proclaimed expert, I believe a key difference between his/her situation and what is typical might be that his/her employees are actually contractors. His labor costs should be higher since the company's financials don't include much or even any of the other line item costs that are factored into total compensation. The costs are paid by the contractor or contractor's firm. Plus, the contractor must also account for idle time in his/her rate.
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Yeah, this entire business thing, I should stop it immediately, I mean I only started towards it in 2009, hired a first person other than myself in 2013, created a product that I actually could sell in the market in 2016, grew to about a 40 people team in 2017. It's not my forte, I just do it because I like 'helping people by hiring them'. So how many businesses are you running, I mean clearly you are much better at it than I am, so I wonder now. I have close to 800 people on calls and data, each call bri
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Yeah, this entire business thing, I should stop it immediately [...] I just do it because I like 'helping people by hiring them'
It certainly seems that way! What other explanation for this absurdity could there be other than you "like helping people by hiring them"?
Again, your claim was: "I hire no more people than the business can AFFORD to hire", which implies that you would hire more people if you could afford to do so. This doesn't make any sense as it would mean that you're actually losing money when you bring on a contractor!
Protip: You should be earning more from the labor performed by the contractor than it costs you to em
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You are still unable to answer a simple question, so this makes this conversation boring. Doubling the cost of labour would immediately cause what result?
As to 'what business can afford' - people, who are on the phones are processing calls and each call makes more than the cost of the person for the same time period. What you clearly don't inderstand is that there are clients, who are paying for the service they are calling to get. In order to provide 24x7 service, 365 days a year (yes, this business n
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. Doubling the cost of labour would immediately cause what result?
It's completely off-topic but ... a reduced margin for normal businesses. You? Failure. That's what you get when your costs are out-of-control.
'what business can afford' [...]
Ah, changing your story I see. Pathetic. What you are now claiming is exactly what I said businesses do -- they hire exactly the number of people they need not "as many as they can afford" which is just laughable.
at the quality and speed that clients need to stay with the service
That your margins suggest that they're apparently not willing to pay for ... very sad...
if you can do better, more efficiently, then you should, you will make money.
It would be hard not to be more efficient than the total shit s
Re: Unions ? (Score:2)
I have friends inside Amazon (workers, not management) and a friend that designs the infrastructure for these a Amazon facilities, and they both saw this coming a while ago (I heard about it 4-6 weeks ago). It's not a surprise, everyone saw it coming.
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I would bet good money that the real reason has to do with Amazon's employment policies, which is what has been driving the unionization effort. Amazon itself was estimating that it would run out of people to hire in the very near future because they treated employees like a disposable commodity.
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Re: Unions ? (Score:2)
To borrow a line from "Animal House"
"Shhh, he's on a roll!"
In his mind workers that haven't even interviewed to work in the planned facilities have already gotten together and voted in the union to represent them at their non-existent workplaces, and that rat-bastard Bezos got wind of their efforts and nipped them in the bud.
As for Amazon & unions, I don't think Amazon fears any particular facility unionizing, what it doesn't want is to have to negotiate employee practices and policies with the Union re
Re: Unions ? (Score:2)
I heard a day or 2 ago the deciding factor for closing some were Unions.
Really, from whom? A carefully read of the fine summary indicates exactly TWO existing facilities are being shuttered, both in Maryland - every other facility mentioned either hadn't opened or hadn't even been built yet.
We're the two Maryland facilities unionized?
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It's not about unions, it's about costs.
Re: Unions ? (Score:2)
Ok ⦠ok â¦. Iâ(TM)m right leaning but here the truth: this has nothing to do with unions. There have been WSJ articles about this.
During the pandemic, the government forced lots of places to close and told everybody to stay home.
Amazon got an exemption from this.
Lots of people stuck at home buy the things they would normally go to a store to buy from Amazon.
Amazon struggles under the load of massive new demand, tries to expand rapidly.
Big parts of the country have decided âo
Nobody wants to work for them anyway (Score:3)
They are already facing staffing shortages across the board in warehouses right? so even if they built all these warehouses they'd run out of hirable people anyway.
Amazon is across the board always trying to squeeze out as much efficiency as possible. We don't have guaranteed delivery timing anymore and odds are it's only going to keep getting worse as they focus on profitability over customer satisfaction. Won't be surprised at all if the return policy takes a hit next.
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Their delivery drivers are not amazon employees but employees of independent shipping companies as far as i'm aware. That's a different setup which is even more disturbing since it means benefits and no clear way to unionize en masse since it's a collection of independent companies.
Re:Nobody wants to work for them anyway (Score:4, Insightful)
Their delivery drivers are not amazon employees but employees of independent shipping companies as far as i'm aware.
The trucks are painted with the Amazon logo, and I can track their location on a map in real time from Amazon's website - I don't think they're independent.
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So?
I can get on a plane that says United operated by their contractor Republic Airways.
The FedEx Home truck that delivers is not owned by FedEx, it's a contractor.
A company authorized it's contractors to use it's logo. Happens all the time.
Re: Nobody wants to work for them anyway (Score:2)
They are independent, for lots and lots of reasons.
Yes, they carry Amazon packages exclusively.
Yes they have the Amazon logo on the side.
Yes they have the ability to track the driver on the Amazon website.
None of those things mean they work for Amazon.
Amazon runs programs to help individuals lease suitable trucks and become a contract carrier for Amazon. When the drivers don't deliver the packages on time, the contractors lose the business they count on from Amazon - Amazon doesn't (usually) hire residentia
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They could always form a consortium.
Re: Nobody wants to work for them anyway (Score:2)
No kidding. I constantly see the option in shipping for letting it take a day or two longer but fewer packages and trips to my mailbox. A feel good option
Except that never seems to happen. Few times I have tried it resulted in pretty much the same number of packages and delivery drops.
I always assumed that might delivery schedules were based off of which warehouse my owners were shipping from. I can't see them shipping from Warehouse A to Warehouse B. Just send me fewer boxes. I'm not even sure how their co
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No one goes that that restaurant any more because it's too crowded. --Yogi Berra.
Amazon CLOSES?! (Score:5, Funny)
Good grief, I had no idea things had gotten so bad! Quick, somebody should start a gofundme for Jeff Bezos!
Hmmmm (Score:2)
It takes 4-7 days for them to deliver to us now (2 miles north gets same day delivery meanwhile). Weâ(TM)ve got a warehouse being built a few miles away. Wish theyâ(TM)d given a list of which ones are goners. Iâ(TM)m hoping it helps us get back to how prime worked here pre-pandemic.
Had to happen eventually (Score:2)
There are only so many DJAKRSK and RKSLANC brands people can stomach.
Only so many $30 1 TB flash drive frauds.
Only so much prime upsell nagging.
Only so many sponsored results.
Only so many search results that return nothing remotely resembling search terms.
Only so many questionable products sold by randos. Amazon is now ebay except with higher prices and an intentionally worthless feedback system.
That eventually people just get burned out and want to do literally anything else other than buy anything from Am
Meanwhile (Score:1)