United Parcel Service is testing a service to let customers pick up their packages from lockers in retail locations, according to Internet Retailer.
UPS plans to use its 4,400 existing bricks-and-mortar locations as pickup points, and also sign up other retail locations where lockers will be located. The delivery service didn’t name any retail partners.
UPS began tests of its UPS Access Point network in New York City and Chicago in July, and plans to expand the service early next year, the company said. The delivery company has operated a similar service in Europe since its 2012 acquisition of Kiala, and now has nearly 12,000 pickup points in the U.K., France, Germany, Spain and the Benelux countries. Most of those pickup points are in local shops such as convenience stores and dry cleaners.
The U.S. tests are taking place in highly populated areas with many apartment buildings, and the lockers are located in stores that are open early in the morning, late at night or on weekends, the company said. In Chicago the tests are being done on the north and west sides and nearby suburbs, while in New York UPS is currently testing in the Bronx, and expanding soon into Brooklyn.
Amazon.com and Walmart have experimented with pickup lockers in the past, but UPS says those locker programs haven’t generated much traffic and UPS is better positioned to make such a service work.
