Reviews of Using Amazon Locker for Pickup of Merchandise
Amazon's lockers are for customers who tin can't or don't want to receive packages at abode. Non all the lockers have been well received.
Getty ImagesAmazon installed a clutch of metal lockers exterior a Fresno, California, gas station convenience store and so customers could pick upward packages they didn't desire delivered directly to their homes. The robin'southward-egg-blueish lockers shared a self-service screen and displayed the e-commerce behemothic's ubiquitous smiling logo.
The problem, according to a Fresno city councilmember's complaints last Nov, was that they were placed along a poorly lit side of the building, out of sight of security cameras. It was easy to predict what happened next: Someone tried to become into the lockers.
The attempted burglary should've been a facepalm moment for Amazon, says the councilmember, Miguel Arias, considering that unmonitored location was certain to tempt criminals. The lockers could collectively hold thousands of dollars of merchandise, far more than attracting than the inexpensive bags of ice typically institute in vending machines in forepart of the pumps.
"I don't know how they landed on a gas station," Arias said of Amazon'southward conclusion to install the lockers. "Information technology's where you go a beer on your way home after hours, non a place where you lot go to get your $500 iPhone."
Afterwards Arias raised his concerns, the Fresno City Council voted to prevent the programmer responsible for the convenience store, a local chain called Johnny Quik, from installing Amazon lockers at a new store he sought to build in another location. The company didn't reply to a request for comment.
Fresno isn't alone in experiencing frustration with Amazon lockers as the visitor installs them across the country to thwart thieves looking for its easy-to-recognize packages on neighborhood stoops. Chicago residents were baffled in Baronial when a set of Amazon lockers were installed straight on walkways in 2 city parks, partially obstructing paths and adding corporate branding to leafy municipal civilities. Photos of the lockers were widely shared on Twitter and Reddit. Businesses have too had 2d thoughts later hit deals to host the lockers.
The Chicago disharmonize taps into larger objections to corporate intrusion onto public belongings. Corporate names have been added to subway stations and high school sports stadiums. Even the National Parks Service has pondered naming benches and interior spaces afterward corporate donors. Transit agencies cover buses and fill train stations with ads.
An Amazon smile in a Chicago park might strike some as a small, if obtrusive, element of the tapestry of corporate messaging already in the public sphere. All the same, activists and civic planners question whether parks should be added to the list of corporate logo-filled locations. Park space is supposed to serve anybody, not merely Amazon customers, said Jennifer Minner, a professor of city and regional planning at Cornell Academy.
"Installing lockers that substantially serve people who are spending coin is taking abroad a broader public benefit that serves more people," Minner said.
Nearly locker placements are uncontroversial, and lockers at bus depots and 7-Elevens rarely enhance eyebrows. Nevertheless, an awkwardly located locker plays into a broader image problem Amazon has had in managing local relations. The company has been blamed for putting Main Street booksellers and local retailers out of business with predatory low pricing. And community activists accept raised concerns well-nigh working conditions for Amazon's subcontracted delivery drivers and at its warehouses -- which are sometimes set up in the disused malls it's blamed for putting out of business.
Amazon didn't provide information about whether it implements condom and offense prevention measures around its outdoor lockers, or whether that's the responsibility of the organizations hosting the lockers. Just Av Zammit, an Amazon spokesman, said in a argument that the company values community feedback. Amazon is reviewing the locker placement in Chicago "to ensure they are all located in appropriate areas that serve both customers and the community," he said.
Amazon spokesperson Alyssa Bronikowski provided further comment. "We have been working closely with the Chicago Park District since 2020 to add together Amazon Lockers post-obit requests from the district for this added benefit for the community," she said. "The focus of our partnership has been to provide park patrons and customs members with admission to a secure and user-friendly delivery choice."
Amazon launched its lockers 10 years agone in Seattle, New York land and the Washington, DC, surface area. Since then, the lockers have been part of its Amazon Hub service, which includes Whole Foods locations where Amazon customers can pick upwardly their packages at the counter. As of 2019, Amazon said it had installed lockers in more than than 900 cities and towns in the US.
Some loftier-rise apartments too take lockers installed and then tenants don't have to expect at habitation for a delivery or depend on an apartment director to give them their packages. Amazon Locker Plus locations offer self-service kiosks besides equally an Amazon attendant to help. UPS also offers delivery lockers with its Access Bespeak Program, and some third-party companies offer lockers that accept packages from multiple carriers. Walmart installed bundle lockers in its own stores, but recently began phasing them out.
Locking out porch pirates
Amazon markets the locker installations as a fashion to gainsay porch piracy, another problem the company helped create. The lockers also serve as a source of income for public agencies and businesses that host them, though in many cases the rent Amazon pays isn't disclosed. In Jacksonville, Florida, for instance, Amazon partnered with the transportation authorization to install lockers at bus terminals and transportation hubs. The agency didn't answer to a request for comment.
The visitor struck a similar arrangement in Johnson Canton, Kansas, with local 7-Eleven stores. 7-Eleven didn't respond to a asking for information on how information technology handles the safety of outdoor lockers.
Neither partnership has prompted complaints near safety or vandalism.
Still, the placement of Amazon lockers hasn't ever gone smoothly. Staples and RadioShack ended agreements with the company in 2013, removing a service that had invited a competitor into their stores. A set of lockers at Sacramento Land Academy in California was removed two months after it was installed in 2014 because the campus bookstore had the exclusive correct to serve as a bookseller at the college.
Few installations have gone equally poorly equally a recent placement in Chicago'south Brands Park.
In photos posted online, one monolithic segment of lockers appears to consume roughly a 3rd of the walkway and create a blind corner. The placement is virtually a contend that would make information technology difficult for a delivery person to unload a dolly of packages while still leaving room for park visitors to get past, peculiarly a visitor who's in a wheelchair or pushing a stroller.
Community members quickly objected. A petition calling for the removal of the lockers appeared on Change.org and racked upward more than 13,000 signatures. (The goal was 15,000.) Alderwoman Rossana Rodriguez-Sanchez, who represents the ward that includes the park, complained about the corporate logo marring public property even though the city was getting rent for the placements.
If the placement of this Amazon locker at a park is real, and so the Chicago Park District is in need of reform. https://t.co/e01zrjR3P1
— ride yo bike, go yo vax (@stevevance) August 13, 2021
Rodriguez-Sanchez said on Twitter that the Amazon-branded behemoths are "a slap in the face," in part because they would net the parks department roughly $137,600 in the first year, at near.
🧵A few things that didn't make it in the commodity. 1. Amazon should not be occupying public space regardless of what they offering just we take to note that 137K is a slap in the face.
— Alderwoman Rossana Rodriguez 🌹🇵🇷✊🏽🌈🏝 (@RossanaFor33) Baronial 23, 2021
2.Corps like Amazon that don't pay taxes impact our ability to fund public services, similar parks. https://t.co/0jkNVuZ0oY
The lockers have been removed from Brands Park, too equally another Chicago park. The program, which had already led to the installation of lockers in 49 parks and aimed for a total of 102 lockers locations, is on hold while the parks department reviews Amazon'southward plans.
There's besides the question of how prophylactic Amazon customers might feel going to a park after work, potentially in the night, to pick up a valuable parcel. In Fresno, city councilmember Arias said the lockers at the Johnny Quik have become an assiduities for his constituents because the convenience shop increased condom by installing additional lighting and security cameras. Nonetheless, he wondered how no i thought of that business organization to begin with.
"You lot can credit Amazon for a lot of innovation in their logistical commitment system," Arias said. Only the initial installation showed "a lack of agreement of the local community."
Source: https://www.cnet.com/tech/tech-industry/amazon-lockers-an-amenity-in-many-places-prompt-pushback-in-others/
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