Avoid Fulfillment Woes

Discover Patterns

Other areas that require attention are inventory functions such as stock put-away, shrinkage control, inventory counts, initial order fill rate and supplies inventory. Analysis of returns reports in particular can help in discovering patterns that need improvement.

Once you’ve gathered all the research and data available for warehouse operations, compare desired service standards with your company’s actual performance. One avenue of analysis is internal data compared with benchmark figures from such sources as trade publications or consulting firms. But it can be extremely useful to compare actual figures from the operations reports of other merchants of comparable size in the same industry. Be careful what period of time you’re comparing yourself in: low, average or peak periods of productivity.