The fortunes of an ecommerce fulfilment warehouse naturally rise and fall with the relative success of the ecommerce companies using their services. And this isn’t the only way in which such organizations are intimately tied to those companies. The ecommerce retail calendar is one of peaks and troughs. And one of those peaks falls around Christmas time.
Around this time, and for obvious reasons, there are usually many more orders placed. In fact, if an ecommerce company doesn’t experience a Christmas run, then this is usually taken as a pretty bad sign of lack of growth and general success. The successful ecommerce ventures, on the other hand, always rise to meet this leap in demand – because it is profitable, obviously.
However, this is no easy task, and one of the major problems facing many ecommerce ventures is not that they do not perform well and experience growth, but they don’t know how to manage that growth when it comes. Successfully tackling Christmas rushes is a good sign that a company is on its way to experiencing sustained growth. The ecommerce fulfilment experts at Shipping and Handling of Texas say that this is precisely because it shows they can muster increased work load and resources needed to meet Christmas demand.
But to return to the ecommerce fulfilment warehouses, just as their success is intimately tied to the number of orders received by their clients, so too do fulfilment warehouses experience a busy Christmas season. If they cannot meet the extra demand, clients could go elsewhere. Furthermore, the best ecommerce fulfilment warehouses turn Christmas into the most profitable time of the year.
The Christmas Challenge
As you might expect, meeting the Christmas rush as an ecommerce fulfilment warehouse often takes the management of extra resources and staff. However, this isn’t necessarily the case – proper planning can stretch existing resources (without over encumbering staff) – but it does need to be careful planning.
An efficient warehouse should ideally be moving stock on just before replenishments arise, using the maximum amount of warehouse space without running out of it. Increased numbers of orders mean that the warehouse needs to work more efficiently if space isn’t going to become an issue. If you find you have more than enough space around Christmas time, then you probably have many empty spaces at other times of the year, which is actually an indication that you are not working to full potential.
The trick, ultimately, is to be working at capacity, but comfortably so.
Tips for Managing Christmas Time in Ecommerce Fulfilment
For those warehouse fulfilment centers coming up for their biggest Christmas period yet and hoping to grasp the nettle of growth which has evidently been grasped by their clients, here follows some bases to cover:
Preparing Space Requirements Early
Before the Christmas rush period starts, you should take care to acquire as many predictions and statistics as possible from your ecommerce partners. This data will allow you to know how much space will be required far in advance.
Ensure Accuracy
Messing up orders takes extra time and resources to correct. If you are working at capacity around Christmas time, then you might not have the resources to correct such mistakes and ensure the efficient management of every other order. Quite simply – take care.
Prepare the Right Staff Numbers
It is not a sustainable strategy to have staff constantly dreading the oncoming season as a time of overwork. Far better that you plan carefully to ensure work is evenly spread and to enlist holiday workers if necessary.
Christmastime is tough in ecommerce, but it is also a time of great opportunity.
