How Amazon is using its massive delivery infrastructure to help L.A. wildfire relief
When a red flag warning was issued in Los Angeles on January 7, a team at Amazon started reaching out to local nonprofits and fire agencies. In a warehouse outside the city—around 60 miles east, in San Bernadino County—the company had opened a wildfire disaster relief hub just months earlier, stocked with free firefighting equipment, from axes to boots to trauma kits. The hub, which sits inside part of a regular Amazon fulfillment center, is one of 14 disaster hubs that the company now runs around the world, donating all of the supplies and logistics support. The work started in 2017, after conversations with nonprofits about the challenges of logistics in a crisis. “The more we spoke with first responders and nonprofits, we realized that it’s really, really hard to procure the right items at the speed that they’re needed,” says Bettina Stix, director of disaster relief and food security for Amazon Community Impact. [Photo: Amazon] In some cases, roads are damaged or a disaster site is otherwise hard to reach. It’s also typically difficult to find supplies in huge quantities. In L.A., for example, more than 7,500 firefighters and other first responders have been working on the ground. Amazon talks to nonprofits and government agencies well in advance of disasters to begin preparing pallets so they’re ready for delivery when they’re needed. Because each disaster is different, relief organizations argued at first that this type of “pre-positioning” wasn’t possible. But as Amazon has worked with organizations over multiple disasters, it analyzes the data about what they use. “We’re able to say, in the last five disasters you’ve asked for these 10 items,” she says. The supplies in each location vary based on which disasters are most likely. A disaster hub in Atlanta is stocked with supplies for hurricanes, for example, from temporary shelters to kits for cleaning up after flooding. The new hub in California opened last August as the first in the U.S. to focus on wildfires, built in recognition of the fact that climate change is making fires more likely and more extreme. [Photo: Amazon] For some organizations, the hubs help supplement existing warehouses. The Red Cross also has multiple warehouses across the U.S. stocked with supplies, “but once there is a major disaster, these items really quickly get used,” says Stix. “And they don’t have time to stock up for a second disaster. So what often happens with the Red Cross is they’re starting to come to us with requests for those second disasters.” Other organizations don’t have a stockpile of supplies themselves, and would have had to find the products and then separately deal with the challenge of finding a broker to supply trucks and make the delivery. “Instead, we offer everything basically all in one,” says Stix. “We deliver a unique service for logistics.” All of the items are requested by relief organizations, avoiding one common problem in disasters: donations often don’t match what nonprofits actually need, leaving staff and volunteers to sort through “disaster pollution.” (In one memorable case after a hurricane in Honduras, there was so much unwanted clothing blocking a runway that a plane with necessary aid couldn’t land.) Amazon aims to deliver the goods within 72 hours, though it can happen faster. In L.A., firefighters had some leftover supplies that Amazon had delivered for a previous fire in Malibu in December, so they didn’t immediately need more. When they did put in a request, the pallets arrived around 24 hours later. [Photo: Amazon] At the hubs, Amazon warehouse staff handle the orders similar to how they handle regular Amazon orders—just on pallets, instead of the usual consumer packaging—and the deliveries go out on Amazon’s normal fleet of delivery vehicles. The company also separately makes donations from Amazon Fresh and Whole Foods; in L.A., for example, it has delivered ready-to-eat meals, toiletries, pet food, charging stations, and other essentials to community centers, along with ingredients for a restaurant to cook 1,000 free meals. In total, so far, it has donated more than 300,000 items to at least two dozen local organizations. The company also donates technical support, such as extra cloud storage for Watch Duty, a free app that Los Angeles residents have been relying on for real-time updates on the fires.
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When a red flag warning was issued in Los Angeles on January 7, a team at Amazon started reaching out to local nonprofits and fire agencies. In a warehouse outside the city—around 60 miles east, in San Bernadino County—the company had opened a wildfire disaster relief hub just months earlier, stocked with free firefighting equipment, from axes to boots to trauma kits.
The hub, which sits inside part of a regular Amazon fulfillment center, is one of 14 disaster hubs that the company now runs around the world, donating all of the supplies and logistics support. The work started in 2017, after conversations with nonprofits about the challenges of logistics in a crisis. “The more we spoke with first responders and nonprofits, we realized that it’s really, really hard to procure the right items at the speed that they’re needed,” says Bettina Stix, director of disaster relief and food security for Amazon Community Impact.
In some cases, roads are damaged or a disaster site is otherwise hard to reach. It’s also typically difficult to find supplies in huge quantities. In L.A., for example, more than 7,500 firefighters and other first responders have been working on the ground.
Amazon talks to nonprofits and government agencies well in advance of disasters to begin preparing pallets so they’re ready for delivery when they’re needed. Because each disaster is different, relief organizations argued at first that this type of “pre-positioning” wasn’t possible. But as Amazon has worked with organizations over multiple disasters, it analyzes the data about what they use. “We’re able to say, in the last five disasters you’ve asked for these 10 items,” she says.
The supplies in each location vary based on which disasters are most likely. A disaster hub in Atlanta is stocked with supplies for hurricanes, for example, from temporary shelters to kits for cleaning up after flooding. The new hub in California opened last August as the first in the U.S. to focus on wildfires, built in recognition of the fact that climate change is making fires more likely and more extreme.
For some organizations, the hubs help supplement existing warehouses. The Red Cross also has multiple warehouses across the U.S. stocked with supplies, “but once there is a major disaster, these items really quickly get used,” says Stix. “And they don’t have time to stock up for a second disaster. So what often happens with the Red Cross is they’re starting to come to us with requests for those second disasters.”
Other organizations don’t have a stockpile of supplies themselves, and would have had to find the products and then separately deal with the challenge of finding a broker to supply trucks and make the delivery. “Instead, we offer everything basically all in one,” says Stix. “We deliver a unique service for logistics.”
All of the items are requested by relief organizations, avoiding one common problem in disasters: donations often don’t match what nonprofits actually need, leaving staff and volunteers to sort through “disaster pollution.” (In one memorable case after a hurricane in Honduras, there was so much unwanted clothing blocking a runway that a plane with necessary aid couldn’t land.) Amazon aims to deliver the goods within 72 hours, though it can happen faster. In L.A., firefighters had some leftover supplies that Amazon had delivered for a previous fire in Malibu in December, so they didn’t immediately need more. When they did put in a request, the pallets arrived around 24 hours later.
At the hubs, Amazon warehouse staff handle the orders similar to how they handle regular Amazon orders—just on pallets, instead of the usual consumer packaging—and the deliveries go out on Amazon’s normal fleet of delivery vehicles. The company also separately makes donations from Amazon Fresh and Whole Foods; in L.A., for example, it has delivered ready-to-eat meals, toiletries, pet food, charging stations, and other essentials to community centers, along with ingredients for a restaurant to cook 1,000 free meals.
In total, so far, it has donated more than 300,000 items to at least two dozen local organizations. The company also donates technical support, such as extra cloud storage for Watch Duty, a free app that Los Angeles residents have been relying on for real-time updates on the fires.
