Order Fulfillment

In a session at last month's National Conference on Operations & Fulfillment in Orlando, Fla., a panel of cross-channel marketers spanning a wide array of product categories presented tips on how their companies survived the economic pressures of 2009 to see the promise of 2010.

Product returns are a part of every merchant's operations, whether you sell online, retail, catalog, B-to-B, apparel, consumer electronics, etc. In fact, according to a recent survey, returns cost retailers $53 billion last year alone. But what's often viewed as a drain on profits and employees’ time can also be an opportunity to attract and retain customers when the process is handled right.

For this very special report, we chose what we believe to be the three most crucial and timely and important topics in operations and fulfillment for multichannel merchants today.

Selecting software for order management or warehouse management systems, e-commerce solutions, or other applications is a challenging task. The process begins by documenting a set of requirements, constructing a request for proposal (RFP), identifying vendors, viewing Web demos, and conducting site visits and reference checks. But a trend is emerging to select vendors based on word-of-mouth recommendations and two-hour Web demos. The question is, is that really the right approach?

Hard times often require difficult decisions. Given the weak business environment and challenges facing multichannel marketers in particular, many have had to make tough choices to cut costs, with outsourcing being one of the options for doing so. Whether in good times or bad, however, outsourcing your order management, call center and/or fulfillment operations is one decision that requires careful consideration. Here are seven signs that you should think about outsourcing fulfillment:

Like many entrepreneurs who launched catalog businesses in bygone eras, the late Eddie Smith, whom I had the pleasure of knowing during the ’90s and early 2000s, stuck firmly to a number of ironclad principles during his 50-plus years at the helm of the National Wholesale catalog.

If inventory value is rising and back order rates are holding steady or increasing, this is a sign that your inventory is out of control. Before you confront your inventory management team, however, consider this: It might not be the team’s fault. Effective inventory management is a combination of art and science. The process seems simple: Review historical sales, project future sales, place orders and receive products. Simple doesn’t mean it’s easy. It requires someone with good instincts to predict trends and analytical skills to transform data into information. The old rules have changed. Economist Vilfredo Pareto’s 80/20 law worked because 80

Doug Eckrote, senior vice president of operations for the technology products and service provider CDW, provided a blueprint to how CDW — which had $8.1 billion in annual sales last year — handles its product distribution in a session at the recent Internet Retailer Conference & Exhibition in Chicago. Competition=Savings With the abundance of freight options available (FedEx, UPS, DHL, USPS), CDW contracts with them all, Eckrote said, to get customers the best rate. The company’s Web site lists every shipping choice for customers after a purchase, with pricing included. Invariably, customers select the lowest price, Eckrote noted. “If a carrier raises its prices,

On June 17-18, Catalog Success and F. Curtis Barry & Co. co-presented the first Evaluating, Selecting and Implementing Direct Commerce Systems interactive workshop in Richmond, Va. The success of this intimate event — we drew 50 percent more attendees than we had planned on — represents an exciting, fresh beginning for both of our organizations, one that could easily lead to greater rewards down the road for us, and most of all, for attendees. For this edition of The Corner View, I asked Curt Barry to give his expert synopsis of the key issues that were addressed during the conference. As he points

Most fulfillment processes are largely manual in nature, as only the very largest companies can justify advanced automation. Looking at the total cost of back-end order fulfillment — including direct and indirect labor, occupancy, and shipping supplies — total labor generally makes up 60 percent to 65 percent. That excludes any shipping costs because they distort the comparisons. Benchmarking ShareGroups, a proprietary program in which participants share benchmarking data, reveals that labor rates were typically around $7 an hour five years ago. Today, they’ve reached $12 to $13 an hour for many direct marketing businesses, plus a 20 percent benefit rate. But overall productivity