Amazon to spend $4 billion on small town delivery expansion

Amazon said Wednesday it plans to spend roughly $4 billion by the end of 2026 on expanding deliveries in rural towns as part of a push to bring faster shipping times to more parts of the U.S.

Once the expansion is complete, more than 200 delivery stations will be added, tripling the size of Amazon’s rural delivery network, the company said. The move will bring products closer to customers, and cut average delivery times “in half,” Amazon added.

“At a time where many logistics providers are backing away from serving rural customers because of cost to serve, we are stepping up our investment to make their lives easier and better,” Udit Madan, Amazon’s senior vice president of worldwide operations, said in a statement.

Amazon has been working to speed up deliveries for the past several years. After making two-day delivery the standard, the company has invested in shuttling packages to shoppers’ doors in one day, or in some cases, within a few hours.

It’s been able to do this by building up a massive network of warehouses across the country, as well as by bringing more of its logistics operations in house. In 2022, Amazon said it was poised to pass UPS and FedEx to become the largest U.S. package delivery service. The company still relies on carriers, including the U.S. Postal Service, for a portion of its deliveries, but it’s handling a significant share via its delivery service partner program, which is made up of thousands of contracted third-party delivery companies.

The announcement comes as Amazon is set to report first-quarter earnings after the bell on Thursday. It’s also landing one day after Amazon drew the ire of the White House for reportedly planning to display how much of an item’s cost is due to tariffs.