Big Brown is getting a lot smaller.
United Parcel Service (UPS) is cutting up to 30,000 more jobs this year, marking another painful step in its long goodbye to its once-biggest customer: Amazon.
The announcement, made Tuesday alongside the company’s earnings, continues a massive multi-year overhaul. It’s a stark sign of how the shipping giant is scrambling to reinvent itself after deciding that delivering Amazon’s millions of daily packages just doesn’t pay the bills like it used to.
For years, Amazon was UPS’s golden goose, but the relationship has soured. UPS leadership has called the volume “extraordinarily dilutive” to profits, essentially meaning they were losing money on the deal. Now, the two companies are on what UPS executives call a “glide path” to significantly reduce their partnership.
The financial impact of that split is now hitting the workforce. UPS Chief Financial Officer Brian Dykes laid out the plan, tying the job cuts directly to the decline in the Amazon business.
“In terms of variable costs, we expect to reduce operational positions by up to 30,000,” Dykes said on a call with analysts, according to reports from CNBC. “This will be accomplished through attrition, and we expect to offer a second voluntary separation program for full-time drivers.”
The company says it plans to cut a staggering 25 million operational hours linked to Amazon volume.
A turnaround built on job cuts and closures
This new wave of cuts is part of a relentless “better, not bigger” turnaround strategy under CEO Carol Tomé. The company isn’t just reducing staff; it’s shrinking its physical footprint and betting on machines.
UPS confirmed it has identified 24 buildings for closure in the first half of 2026, with more potentially on the block later. This follows the closure of 93 facilities last year. Furthermore, Dykes stated the company plans to “further deploy automation” across its network, as reported by CNBC.
The scale of the retrenchment is jarring. These 30,000 planned cuts come on the heels of a massive reduction of 48,000 jobs in 2025 alone, a number that far exceeded the company’s original estimates.
The union watches closely
With a large unionized workforce, these cuts don’t happen in a vacuum. The International Brotherhood of Teamsters, which represents hundreds of thousands of UPS workers, issued a statement.
“We’re perfectly happy for UPS to realize growth and cost savings on the backs of corporate managers so long as they uphold their contractual commitments to our members and reward the Teamsters who actually make the company run,” the union stated, per CNBC.
The statement also noted that workers “still know [their] worth” if UPS brings back its buyout program.
A fresh start after a dark year
The restructuring comes as UPS tries to move past a difficult 2025, which was marred by a fatal MD-11 cargo plane crash in Louisville, Kentucky. That accident, which killed 15 people, led to the grounding and subsequent total retirement of the MD-11 fleet.
UPS confirmed Tuesday that it has completed the phase-out, a move that cost the company $137 million but clears the way for more modern Boeing 767s.
Despite the job cuts and the $5.5 billion net income being slightly down from 2024, CEO Carol Tomé remains optimistic about the pivot.
“2025 was a year of considerable progress for UPS as we took action to strengthen our revenue quality and build a more agile network,” Tomé said. “Looking ahead, upon completion of the Amazon glide-down, 2026 will be an inflection point in the execution of our strategy to deliver growth and sustained margin expansion.”
Also read: Over half of leaders who pursued AI-driven layoffs later regretted the decision, a reminder that cost cuts can create second-order problems.
