Wayfair is making moves to gain more control over last-mile delivery and the earlier steps along the logistics path.

This past October, the home furnishings e-commerce company opened the first of what are now five Wayfair leased and operated last-mile delivery facilities, CEO and Co-founder Niraj Shah said on the second quarter earnings conference call.

He didn’t name the markets but said they’re all in Top 20 metro areas and they’re are off to an “encouraging” start, as Wayfair aims for more direct final mile control for those large items — sofas and bedroom groups, for instance — that are too bulky to deliver via FedEx or UPS.

“We’ve focused on honing the operation, and now that we’ve made significant strides in customer experience and operating efficiency, we are working on adding to the service level and rolling this out across the country,” he said.

“We intend to continue taking direct control of our line-haul trucking, pool points and cross docks and expect to have a total of eight metro areas operating with our own last mile delivery facilities (by the first quarter of next year) and double that by the end of 2017.”

(Source: Casual Living  Author: Clint Engel)