According to GeekWire, Amazon is testing a new rapid delivery concept at a shuttered Seattle site that will function like a retail store but won’t allow any actual customers inside. The Ballard location at 5100 15th Ave. NW will operate 24/7 with employees fulfilling online orders in back while Flex drivers cycle through in roughly two-minute intervals to grab packages. The facility, coded ZST4 under Amazon’s new “Amazon Now” delivery type, is expected to dispatch about 240 vehicles daily with peak volumes of 15-20 trips per hour. This represents Amazon’s latest push into “sub-same-day” delivery using small, hyperlocal operations rather than traditional warehouses.
How this delivery experiment actually works
Here’s the basic flow: Amazon employees pick and bag items in a back room, then place completed orders on shelves up front. Flex drivers arrive, scan in, grab their assigned package, confirm with an associate, and bounce – ideally within two minutes flat. Some drivers will even use e-bikes and scooters, which tells you everything about the short distances involved.
What’s really interesting is how Amazon is framing this as a retail operation to fit zoning requirements. Their filings describe Flex drivers as “customer representatives” and emphasize the retail-style nature. Basically, they’re trying to avoid the whole “dark store” regulatory headache that’s hit cities like New York and Paris, where officials are cracking down on storefronts that don’t actually serve walk-in customers.
The profitability question
Supply-chain analyst Marc Wulfraat of MWPVL International calls these “lab experiments to test if the concept is profitable.” And that’s the billion-dollar question here. The challenge with these small-format sites is that each order tends to be low-value, so the combined cost of fulfilling and delivering it can eat up a huge chunk of the revenue.
Amazon has been here before. Remember Amazon Today? That same-day delivery program that used Flex drivers to pick up from mall retailers? It failed because drivers were often leaving with just one or two items, making the cost per delivery astronomical compared to traditional warehouse routes.
Where this fits in Amazon’s bigger picture
This isn’t Amazon’s first rodeo with this building – it previously housed one of only two Amazon Fresh Pickup locations in the entire country before closing in early 2023. Now they’re recycling the space for another experiment.
The ZST4 code suggests this is part of a broader rollout – drivers have spotted similarly named sites in Seattle’s University District and Philadelphia. Amazon’s basically throwing different models at the wall to see what sticks in the ultra-competitive quick-commerce space against players like GoPuff and DoorDash.
Here’s the thing: by operating the entire process themselves instead of partnering with retailers, Amazon might finally crack the economics. They control inventory flow, pickup efficiency, and labor costs all under one roof. But can they make the numbers work where others have struggled? That’s what this Ballard experiment will determine.
