Modern warehouses have revolutionized the way ecommerce is conducted. They have offered greater efficiency when it comes to supply chain and distribution issues, and they typically feature all sorts of technological advancements which allows for savings to be made as well. Olympic Eyewear, a sunglasses wholesaler, say that in their form of business too modern warehousing has revolutionized the field.
Wholesalers typically provide very large bulk orders. When business is steady and there is no new influx of orders or clients, then it is perhaps possible for warehousing costs to be cut and things like cross dock services used in order to move things as efficiently as possible from manufacturers to customers. However, there should always be a warehousing budget with any wholesaler, as being caught out with a lot of inventory and insufficient space to store it is a sure way to disappoint clients by delivering orders late.
Warehouse Management and Wholesale
The good thing about wholesale, where warehousing is concerned, is that the customer base is not a vast array of different individual customers who are continually placing all manner of different orders (and rarely the same order twice); rather it is made up of a much smaller number of business clients who expect a regular shipment of very large orders.
Accordingly, more longer-term planning can be put in place. Revenue can be calculated exactly and, in the case of repeat orders (which are common) revenue projections can be much more accurately made. Therefore, the type of warehouse provision any wholesaler needs should be similarly easy to work out.
Tips for Wholesaler Warehouse Management
Nevertheless, given the nature of the orders and inventory that will have to be warehoused, a few special provisions need to be put in place. You might have a clear idea about what will be moving through your supply chain and when, but you will still require the space to adequately, and sometimes at short notice, store very large orders for periods of time. A warehousing policy is therefore essential. Here follows some top tips to help you out:
Offer Special Pricing for Overstocked Inventory
Given the sheer amount of inventory that a wholesaler will need to have ready to go at any given time, the phenomenon of overstocked inventory is sure to come along sooner or later. In such cases, you can offer deals on this overstocked inventory in order to move it quicker. These deals can be offered on a short-term basis, as and when the inventory becomes overstocked. You might even make some new clients this way, willing to place repeat orders. Make the most of this situation.
Make Ordering and Delivery as Seamless as Possible
In practice, this means ensuring that your ordering process is efficient (you should make use of a B2B wholesale ordering system) and that the goods go from manufacturer to warehouse to client as quickly as possible. You can speed things up with cross dock services, which is also great for freeing up space in your warehouses if you have a sudden hike in business activity.
Use the Latest Inventory Management Technology
You should really not go cheap or cut corners in this department. Having a handle on your inventory is absolutely essential. You need to effectively track incomings and outgoings as well as make use of inventory management software. Whenever there is a free space opening for long enough in your warehouse, it should be put to use.
Warehousing is one of the fundamentals of ecommerce success, and it would not be inaccurate to say that within the wholesaling industry it is even more important still.
