WARWICK – The United Parcel Service Inc. is planning to cut approximately 20,000 jobs and close more than 70 facilities as part of the worldwide shipping company’s “largest network reconfiguration” ever, including reducing the amount of Amazon.com Inc. shipments it handles.
But how or if the company’s presence in Warwick will be impacted remains unclear.
UPS said during its first-quarter earnings call on April 29 that it anticipates making the job cuts this year. It anticipates closing 73 leased and owned buildings by the end of June. UPS said that it is still reviewing its network and may identify more buildings to be shuttered.
“The actions we are taking to reconfigure our network and reduce cost across our business could not be timelier,” CEO Carol Tomé said in a statement. “The macro environment may be uncertain, but with our actions, we will emerge as an even stronger, more nimble UPS.”
In January UPS announced that it had reached a deal with Amazon, its biggest customer, to lower its volume by more than 50% by the second half of 2026.
In a statement to Providence Business News on Thursday, UPS spokesperson Karen Tomaszewski Hill said the company’s initiative will optimize the capacity of its network to align with expected volume levels and enhance productivity through additional automation.
Tomaszewski Hill acknowledged the reconfiguration “will impact positions” and UPS is “committed to supporting our employees throughout the process.” UPS currently employs approximately 490,000 people worldwide, with 406,000 working in the U.S., according to the company's public filings with the U.S. Securities Exchange Commission.
Tomaszewski Hill declined to say if the local UPS employees or locations will be impacted by the company's latest plans, citing the affected employees need to be notified first. She also declined to say how many employees specifically work in UPS’ Warwick presence, which was
impacted by layoffs by the company last year.
UPS last February filed a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification letter with the R.I. Department of Labor and Training indicating that layoffs of 130 employees by April 2 would affect members of Teamsters Local 251, the union representing truck drivers. The federal notification law requires companies to alert the DLT before laying off a significant number of workers.
The layoffs are related to the company’s plans to reduce packing and sorting activities in Warwick and other UPS facilities. UPS also on April 2 closed its day sort operations in Warwick. The closure is related to volume demands and there are multiple sorts in each facility including day, twilight and night, UPS spokesperson Jim Mayer said at the time.
UPS also reported its first-quarter financial results on Tuesday. The Atlanta-based company earned $1.19 billion, or $$1.40 per share, in the quarter ended March 31.
Stripping out certain items, earnings were $1.49 per share. That’s better than the $1.44 per share that analysts polled by Zacks Investment Research were calling for.
Revenue totaled $21.55 billion, beating Wall Street’s estimate of $21.06 billion.
UPS said that it wasn’t providing any updates to its previously announced full-year outlook, given current macroeconomic uncertainty. The company previously said that it expected 2025 revenue of approximately $89 billion.
James Bessette is the PBN special projects editor, and also covers the nonprofit and education sectors. You may reach him at Bessette@PBN.com. You may also follow him on X at @James_Bessette. Reports from PBN reporter Katie Castellani and the Associated Press were included in this story.
