Stord Acquires AMS Fulfillment for $200 Million The 3PL consolidation wave continues. Fast-growing e-commerce logistics provider Stord has acquired rival AMS Fulfillment in a massive $200 million deal. The acquisition adds over 1 million square feet of warehouse space and brings Stord's global network to nearly 100 fulfillment locations. Stord plans to leverage AMS's existing automated bin sorting systems to accelerate its investments in robotics and AI-driven fulfillment. Both great partners of ours at Third Person, of course! Source: Axios
Amazon to Hire 300,000 U.S. Workers for the Holidays
To handle the impending Q4 surge, Amazon announced it will hire more than 300,000 seasonal workers in the U.S. this year. This aggressive hiring push underscores its immense operational scale and will put further strain on the broader supply chain labor market as 3PLs and regional carriers compete for warehouse and delivery talent. Source: WSJ
Port of Long Beach Sets Record, Nears 1M Containers
The import boom shows no signs of slowing down on the West Coast. The Port of Long Beach just reported a record-breaking month, handling nearly 1 million shipping containers, its busiest month in 115 years and a 25% increase from September 2025. The historic volume is being driven by retailers frantically front-loading inventory to avoid potential tariff hikes and mitigate any lingering risks of supply chain disruptions before the holidays. Source: FreightWaves
Panama Canal Bounces Back with Growth in Transits and Tonnage After a brutal period of drought and restrictions, the Panama Canal is officially recovering. In fiscal year 2026, the waterway handled 13,951 vessel transits, marking a 4.1% increase from the previous year. Total tonnage also jumped 6.5% to 521 million tons. The recovery was aided by returning rainfall and shifting trade flows, bringing much-needed relief to global maritime chokepoints. Source: Panama Canal Authority
Federal Audit Finds Thousands of Delayed Mail Pieces in Nashville
A quick local story right here from my backyard in Nashville: A federal audit of a Nashville post office about 3 miles from me (certainly not my local P.O.!) uncovered 5,158 pieces of delayed mail at the Church Street post office in Nashville during a July inspection. The audit was filed Sept. 17 by the U.S. Postal Service Office of Inspector General after customer complaints. As we enter the busiest shipping season of the year, this serves as a stark reminder of the localized operational frictions that can plague the national postal network. Source: WSMV
Department of the Weird: The $1M Pokémon FedEx Heist
In one of the strangest cargo thefts of the year, roughly $1 million worth of rare Pokémon trading cards were stolen from a FedEx truck. Cargo theft has been a massive, escalating issue in the logistics industry recently, but thieves targeting high-value collectibles over traditional electronics or apparel shows how sophisticated and targeted these rings have become. Source: WSJ
