Amazon Reaches Next-Day Delivery Goal for Anchorage
Next-day delivery in Alaska is now no problem for some Amazon items.
Photo Credit: Amazon
One of the perks of living in the Lower 48 is easy access to next-day delivery from Amazon. Alaska is at the extreme end of the online retailer’s logistics routes, so raising the level of service has been a challenging goal. This week, the company announced it achieved its vision: next-day delivery is no longer out of reach for Alaskans.
Early Airtime Gets the Goal
The next-day milestone achievement is the result of a logistics network Amazon has been building in Alaska since opening its Anchorage delivery station in November 2023. Before it opened in a refurbished Sears warehouse, shoppers often waited two weeks or more for online orders. The local station cut that to two days—pretty fast, but twice as long a wait as next-day delivery. As of this week, eligible orders can arrive the next day.
The change is facilitated by a daily Amazon Air connection between Washington and Alaska. Each morning, Anchorage-bound packages leave Amazon’s fulfillment center in Arlington, Washington, and travel on the first Amazon Air flight of the day to Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport. Orders are sorted upon arrival and loaded for distribution that same day, a full day ahead of standard orders.
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“When we opened, customers in Anchorage were waiting weeks for packages. We cut that to two days in our first year, and now we deliver the next day,” says Zach Adair, who leads Amazon’s Anchorage delivery station. “That is not a small thing for people in this market. Alaskans deserve the same fast, reliable service that customers anywhere else in the country expect, and we are proud to finally be able to offer that.”