Uber cuts courier prices & expands, now handles 'thousands of deliveries' per week

Updated 9:08 a.m. ET with a comment from Postmates.

Nearly three months after launching its “UberRUSH” courier service in New York, Uber has quietly cut prices and expanded the initiative beyond Manhattan.

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In an update on its blog, Uber shares that it now offers flat rate deliveries to “Brooklyn or Queens.” And in an email to spur adoption, Uber announced price cuts ranging from 20 to 30 percent — pickup and delivery services now start at $11, down from $16.

Now valued at $17 billion, Uber is no stranger to price cuts or hikes. The firm recently lowered car service prices in LA but raised the price of its mid-level service in New York back in April.

Uber claims its “partners are making thousands of deliveries each week.” On-demand delivery service Postmates, by comparison, tells VentureBeat that it “is currently doing around 15,000 deliveries a week across 9 markets.”

From what we can see, Uber has no plans to expand its courier service outside of New York in the short term, although the firm continues to aggressively expand its car service in the U.S. and abroad.

UberRush currently operates like a traditional bike messenger courier service — the firm does not yet purchase goods for users on-demand — but recent partnerships with firms like cosmetics startup Birchbox, clothing rental service Rent The Runway, and product design community Quirky reveal Uber’s intentions to expand into product delivery.

Such an expansion will create new competition for existing on-demand delivery services like Google Shopping Express, a declining eBay Now, WunWun, Postmates, and Instacart.

For more on UberRush, check out VentureBeat’s exclusive report on the service.