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In retail, success is not only about what you sell; it’s about how efficiently you may get products into customers’ hands – a critical challenge for e-commerce firms facing a flood of orders during peak seasons. And because peak seasons are now not limited to holiday shopping or defined by Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals, retailers must establish the logistical foundations to deal with unusual price spikes long after the holiday decorations are put away.
Today’s e-commerce environment is characterised by smaller, predictable peaks, akin to those associated with major product launches or seasonal trends specific to company offerings (e.g., order volumes for Eclipse glasses surged over American paper optics before this 12 months’s rare solar eclipse). At the same time, online retailers must face unpredictable peaks in demand, akin to when a previously “unseen” product goes viral on TikTok, or a supply chain disruption causes shortages of certain products – or, in the case of Aroma Retail, when appearance on Good Morning America led to an environmental fragrance company fulfilling $250,000 price of orders in an hour.
Because peak volumes tend to strain warehouse and logistics operations, online retailers must create a scalable, seamless warehouse picking and shipping workflow to make sure that the right products are shipped and delivered on time. Of course, this is much easier said than done.
It all starts in the warehouse
While some retailers could also be tempted to draw more attention to this issue during peak periods, this approach is hampered by the constraints of persistent labor shortages – a recent study found 77% supply chain and logistics leaders are struggling with a certain labor shortage in their organizations and the need to devote additional time to training and the inflow of temporary staff.
Alternatively, forward-thinking retailers are implementing strategies for warehouse layout and organization, efficient inventory management, and seamless warehouse data flow to build an effective line of defense against the flood of orders. Automation plays a central role in this approach, eliminating inefficient manual tasks, reducing costs, and supporting positive customer experiences with accurate and fast shipments – without burning out teams or breaking the bank.
Carefully planned warehouse space
Warehouse layout is greater than just racks, aisles and stations – it’s a blueprint for operational success. By implementing organizational strategies to improve warehouse flow and maximize picking efficiency, firms can higher meet demands during each planned and unusual peaks.
For example, during scheduled peaks, fast-moving products ought to be placed in aisles near packing and shipping stations to reduce transit time. Seemingly minor organizational changes, akin to aisles wide enough to accommodate additional pickers to reduce congestion, or a gap in a long series of picking locations to allow pickers to get to the next aisle to minimize end-to-end travel, can provide significant productivity gains .
Warehouse flexibility and agility – the ability to reconfigure, add more packing stations, and quickly change the warehouse layout – is an integral a part of scalability. To this end, some retailers are creating flexible warehouse environments, opting for modular cardboard racks or palletized bin locations that may be easily moved as needed to meet increasing picking volumes.
Retailers must also ensure they have sufficient equipment and shipping materials for the summits. For example, multiple packaging stations configured in advance prove invaluable when they need to be put into operation immediately to scale up order achievement. Likewise, the key to meeting spikes in demand is an adequate supply of shipping boxes, tapes and filler materials to ensure orders are packed efficiently.
For growing e-commerce brands, warehouse space optimization may be improved by using e-commerce warehouse management software (WMS) to create route-optimized picking lists for the warehouse team. Orders containing similar items may be picked more efficiently by using a multi-order picking list, for example, requiring fewer staff to take up warehouse space.
Additionally, using mobile barcode scanners and an e-commerce WMS to enable a dynamic location system (called chaotic warehousing) allows firms to display and move any SKU anywhere in the warehouse, maximizing warehouse capability and flexibility – by as much as 40% – avoiding bad decisions and scale quickly during peak periods without disrupting existing processes.
Paving the way for seamless pick-pack-ship workflows
With efficiency and productivity in mind during peak seasons, the strategy of delivering goods to shipment ought to be one smooth chain of events, without any obstacles or problems. By eliminating disruptions in picking operations – by pre-labelling before pickup, ensuring label and barcode accuracy, and replenishing items before the every day picking process begins – online retailers can set the stage for a fast, smooth and accurate order achievement flow.
In addition to eliminating time-consuming and costly manual barcode-based picking and automated printing of labels and packing lists, retailers should focus on their shipping workflow. By automating the shipping process using specially developed technology, e-commerce firms can save time and money, even during seasons with high shipment volumes.
Perfect for small and medium-sized online retailers focused on growth but struggling with rising operational costs – from sourcing to shipping – in addition to customers’ highly personalized delivery expectations, automated shipping technology can reduce the need to ship goods during peak seasons. In particular, scalable, multi-carrier shipping software can use automation rules to prevent order achievement bottlenecks and increase efficiency, mechanically evaluate prices to find the most cost-effective shipping service, and lower shipping costs through discounted carrier rates.
Retailers must also consider that an integrated set of software solutions can speed up order achievement by helping data flow more efficiently between operations; With a single barcode scan, you may launch relevant background processes, from label printing to customer order status and payment notifications. Indeed, by integrating WMS shipping and e-commerce technology with chosen sales channels and/or e-commerce platforms (e.g. Shopify), retailers can automate workflows, increase accuracy and tighten inventory control with real-time visibility.
In today’s unpredictable retail world, the ability to successfully navigate unusual peak seasons is a key differentiator. It is not enough to manage routine operations; firms need a warehouse environment that may scale to meet changing demands. By combining warehouse automation with physical layout and organizational strategies, e-commerce retailers can capitalize on peak periods while setting the stage for year-round sustainability.