Why Amazon deliveries are sluggish throughout the pandemic

Shopping on Amazon does not feel the exact same throughout this pandemic. “Two-day delivery” feels more like “someday delivery.” Many products appear to be completely “unavailable” and state’s attorney generals of the United States are pushing the website to authorities cost gouging. Meanwhile, the website rotated far from equipping its most popular classification to deal with the need for more vital products.

All of this is taking place at a business that’s thought about the design for customer-centric service and logistics expertise. But an unexpected worldwide pandemic throughout a typically light retail duration in addition to quickly altering product need and a progressively dissatisfied labor force has actually strained even Amazon’s proficiency of online retail. Ironically, its scale might not be assisting: Amazon brings in the frustrating bulk of online retail sales in the United States and, for that reason, the frustrating share of rise sometimes like these.

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Three reporters who follow Amazon closely see the company’s struggles through different lenses, and don’t even agree on whether Amazon is struggling at all. 

“This is typically the time when retailers are retrenching after the holidays,” says Ben Fox Rubin, senior reporter for CNET. “This spike in demand during a typically quiet part of the year has caught them completely by surprise.” Even Prime Day, Amazon’s invented shopping holiday, is expected to be cancelled for 2020.

In the end, this pandemic could cause many to review the role of Amazon in their daily life, though perhaps with little change as a result. “Amazon is still the most customer-centric company in the world,” says Lisa Lacy, senior writer at Adweek. “They have 150 million Prime members and have amassed a loyal following by putting the customer first. For the Amazon brand itself to take a beating would require some pretty extraordinary events.” 

Jose Pagliery, investigative reporter for Univision 41 in New York, isn’t as sanguine about the company’s prospects. “When we turn toward shopping online, the people who pack, ship and deliver those orders still have to go to work,” says Pagliery, who’s covered worker strikes and complaints of unsafe conditions. “Either these strikes are going to put a halt to Amazon’s activity, or slow it down, or the pandemic will.”