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

Postal Hub podcast

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