After a high-profile split, FedEx and Amazon.com have explored doing more business with each other.
The two companies last year discussed FedEx accepting returns of Amazon packages at its retail locations, bringing the delivery giant a share of the business, according to a person familiar with the matter. Amazon has partnerships with a number of companies, including FedEx rival United Parcel Service, to handle the millions of returns it has annually.
The talks with FedEx happened last spring, around the same time that Amazon introduced a fee for some customers who bring their returns to UPS stores.
In October, UPS signed a $465 million deal to buy Happy Returns, which has partnerships with several retailers and thousands of return drop-off sites in its network. The deal enabled UPS to reduce its exposure to Amazon and handle returns from other online retailers.
Happy Returns included FedEx Office locations as a drop-off point for packages prior to being purchased by UPS and now no longer does so. It doesn’t accept drop-offs of Amazon returns.
Ties between FedEx and Amazon began to fray in 2019 when FedEx, then led by founder Fred Smith, said it would end delivery contracts to move Amazon’s boxes. Since then FedEx has tried to fill its trucks and planes with parcels from other companies.
Read more here from The Wall Street Journal.
