Ep 302: Spending power, in-store shopping, and parcel volumes

Cathy Morrow Roberson, founder and lead analyst at Logistics Trends and Insights, discusses what trends in consumer spending power and in-store shopping mean for e-commerce parcel volumes. Trends in US consumers' spending power What consumers are buying Consumers looking for bargains, and retailers looking to offload inventory Discretionary spending vs essential purchases Rising food prices and fluctuating fuel prices Are consumers returning to in-store shopping? If so, is this at the expense of e-commerce? The pandemic effect on retailers moving to omnichannel What does all this mean for parcel volumes? FedEx, UPS and USPS have been experiencing parcel volume declines Carriers looking for more profitable parcels Rate increases offsetting volume declines Regional carriers picking up volumes, but still representing a small percentage of overall parcel volumes The future for delivery and e-commerce Inflation and interest rates Excess last mile capacity Automating sorting facilities Warehousing employment in the USA