The Pros and Cons of Automating in 3PL
The Pros and Cons of Automating in 3PL over on the warehousing industry news blog from the UK's best 3PL [...]
Ecommerce is one of the biggest growing platforms globally, which means warehouses face uncertainty in running operations and processes. Ensuring that there is a scalable and intelligent automation process in place delivers the flexibility to manage seasonal/sustained growth.
As your ecommerce business grows, it is important to take warehouse scalability into consideration.
Growing successfully as a business should be celebrated, however, it’s not uncommon that you may face the dilemma of choosing the right warehouse to suit your ever-growing needs. Will it meet your needs in 5 years time? Because that is possibly how long it could take to see any ROI.
Although it’s great for any business, growing at a fast pace can cause functioning struggles for retailers and ecommerce businesses who do not have the space to scale productively. Growth comes with an increase in expenses, such as hiring new staff, shipping/packing costs and any additional supplies to fulfill orders.
Even if you have enough financial support in place, without proper planning to ensure warehouse scalability, fulfillment issues are unavoidable. You will face logistical and capacity struggles regardless of financial support.
With so much competition, any business that can’t keep up and fail to provide customer satisfaction will fall. There are a few ways to create a balance to achieve sustainable growth without compromising customer care.
Take a step back and consider your business success. Retailers who only see large spikes in sales during the seasonal period need to consider the options available to cope with short-term demand rather than pay out for constant support when business dies down in quieter times.
For retailers that have nonseasonal/natural growth, there are a number of options to consider such as automated packing, material handling equipment, and sortation solutions that will provide the best possible ROI along with warehouse scalability for years to come. It is important to rediscover what your business needs to scale, keeping the perfect balance between increasing cash flow and meeting customer expectations.
Bray Solutions own industrial estates, which means we can build extra space if and when it’s needed. We are currently waiting on a building extension of 20k square foot of additional space. The most important question retailers need to ask is ‘Can you scale with my business?’ Future-proofing is the most important consideration. While the warehouse you chose might suit your immediate needs, what about the future? If your business continues to grow it’s important that 3PL can grow with you.
Making accurate product predictions is key for retail companies, especially when choosing a 3PL or warehouse environment. You can make some costly mistakes if you assume you’ll only sell a few hundred products and you end up needing to fulfil 1000, or even worse, the other way round. You need to have clear communication and trust with your 3PL provider, so they can get to know your business and understand the peaks and troughs in sales.
Make note of your orders from each day, week and month, making sure you include the number of units per order and what type of products are selling the best. Once you have measured this information, your 3PL provider can take over and decide which equipment, automation solutions and technology you need to invest in.
Having accurate estimates is all well and good, but you will need the assets, resources and advanced tech to meet long-term warehouse scalability. It is much more expensive in the long run to make last minute changes rather than making investments in advance. Be proactive, not reactive!
When you take planning, precise forecasting and sensible, yet calculated investments into consideration for your business, you’ll have the ability to meet customer demand while still ensuring profits.
Here at Bray Solutions, we can provide the infrastructure and resources to handle your growth. Let us take the stress of warehouse scalability out of your hands and into our warehouse.
We integrate with a number of different systems.
Get in touch to find out how we can help.