If you’ve been in the warehouse business for any appreciable amount of time, you know exactly what it’s like trying to keep up with the changing demands of the retail business that surrounds you.
Trends in retail may come and go, but if there’s one thing we know is here to stay, it’s e-commerce and the convenience it provides. Changes spurred on by huge retailers like Amazon and Target have pushed retailers into offering faster and faster shipping times on nearly all of their products, and a recent survey showed that more than half of all retailers in North America are offering two-day or same-day delivery in response to this pressure from the big guns.
While this is all well and good for the retailers themselves to improve customer satisfaction and retention, expedited shipping asks even more of the warehouses and fulfillment centers they get their products from. If your warehouse is unprepared for the demands of faster shipping and next-day fulfillment, you can be caught off guard by some of the changes it may make to how you do business.
Before you offer your expedited shipping services to a retailer or vendor partner, here’s a few things you can do to get ready:
Plan with your shipping partners
If you’ve been approached by a retailer to provide faster shipping and/or area-specific dropshipping options through your warehouse, you’ll need to make sure you have a shipping partner that can keep up with this increased demand. Work with your current shipping providers to see what their rates are for two-day, overnight, and same-day shipping, let them know what changes you’ll be facing in your warehouse in the short term, and don’t be afraid to shop around - you may be able to save a lot of money in the long run with other shipping vendors depending on how long you’ll be partnering with the retailer in question.
Agree on how shipments and returns are handled
Due to the influx of demand and activity your warehouse will see as a result of these changes, you’ll need to make sure you can handle the outgoing shipments and potential incoming returns, which are often shipped and handled just as quickly as the item was in the first place. Make sure your shipment processing teams are equipped with all the industrial workstations and clip shelving they need to store and process picked goods and incoming returns, and work with your new retail partner to establish KPIs and baselines for how returns are brought in and shipped back out.
Provide storage for items shipped using faster methods
If you’re already in the warehousing business, you’ll want to make sure any products being sold or shipped with expedited shipping options are kept outside of the general population, as it were. Work with your team to establish specific pallet racking and wire shelving for all goods being offered with expedited shipping. This will help with both picking speed, counting accuracy, and overall warehouse organization.
Optimize your space overall
After your items have been properly segregated and stored in a way that makes them easier to access, you’ll want to take steps to make sure your entire warehouse is working the way it should be. Everything from the way you position SKUs and barcodes on your warehouse shelving to the way your items are grouped and placed (by sales volume or item type) should be reviewed and optimized for prime positioning and ease of access by your workers to ensure no snags along the delivery process - after all, the fastest shipping in the world won’t help if your team can’t find the items that need to get out the door.