The United Parcel Service (UPS) is expected to reduce its workforce by roughly 20,000 during 2025, citing “new or increased tariffs” and “changes in general economic conditions in the U.S. or internationally” for the cuts.
UPS announced the layoffs April 29 in its first quarter earnings report, in which the parcel delivery service said it made consolidated revenues of $21.5 billion, compared to $21.7 billion around the same time a year ago. The shipping company also said it would be closing roughly 164 facilities by the end of the year.
Consolidation efforts for UPS come as President Donald Trump‘s looming tariffs continue to impact U.S. and global trade, as companies across the country are reducing costs in preparation for a possible economic fallout. In 2024, UPS employed around 490,000 people worldwide, including about 330,000 Teamsters-represented jobs in the U.S.
“The actions we are taking to reconfigure our network and reduce cost across our business could not be timelier,” Carol Tomé, UPS’s chief executive officer, said in the report. “The macro environment may be uncertain, but with our actions, we will emerge as an even stronger, more nimble UPS.”
For UPS specifically, it cautioned in January that it was expediting its plan to reduce millions of deliveries for its largest customer, Amazon.com, which accounted for 11.8% of its overall revenue in 2024, CNBC reported.
“We are reducing the amount of volume we deliver for Amazon by more than 50% by June 2026,” Brian Dykes, UPS’ chief financial officer, said in a statement to USA TODAY. “Associated with this volume reduction, we are undertaking the largest network reconfiguration in our history. This effort has been combined with our Network of the Future initiative as both will help drive us to a more efficient network.”
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt lashed out at Amazon after a report said the e-commerce giant was planning to list the costs of Trump’s tariffs next to the total prices of products, which Leavitt called “a hostile and political act” while speaking to reporters on April 29.
According to Dyke, UPS’s “planned reductions are in line with the total Amazon volume decline.”
In addition to the position cuts, UPS said it plans to close 73 leased and owned buildings by the end of June 2025, according to the earnings report. Dyke said the total number of operational closures by the end of the year is expected to be 164.
The closures will consist of facilities that are part of UPS’ U.S. Ground operation, where packages are unloaded, sorted and loaded, a spokesperson told USA TODAY.
“We are continuing to review our network and may identify additional buildings for closure,” the Atlanta-based parcel delivery service said.
The job cuts and building closures are expected to save UPS $3.5 billion in 2025, the earnings report says. UPS’ consolidation and cost-saving initiative, “Network Reconfiguration and Efficiency Reimagined,” is expected to end in 2027, according to the parcel delivery service.
UPS, the world’s largest package delivery firm, forecasted in January a full-year revenue of $89 billion, CNBC reported.
In January 2024, UPS announced the layoffs of nearly 12,000 employees across the globe to “align resources for 2024.”
During a company earnings call at the time, Tomé said the cuts would save the company nearly $1 billion. His comments came after UPS underwent a massive year-over-year decline in revenue.
“I want to thank UPSers for providing the best on-time performance of any carrier for the sixth year in a row,” Tomé said in a statement released by the company in 2024. “2023 was a unique and difficult year and through it all we remained focused on controlling what we could control, stayed on strategy and strengthened our foundation for future growth.”
UPS cutting around 20,000 jobs amid 'new or increased tariffs'; 164 buildings closing – USA Today
