End-to-end journey visibility
Fast-evolving ‘Track and Trace’ apps help all parties, and is an excellent business resource for the delivery provider. The delighted customer always knows where the parcel is – and if they’re not at the address to receive a parcel, that helps the supplier, too. The driver’s journey time is cut, pointless journeys are reduced, and routes are automatically optimised by the software to cut fuel miles and emissions. Realtime visibility of transport fleets, now being supplemented by Artificial Intelligence (AI) innovation, aids on the spot and future transport decision-making for transport managers, by updating data in realtime on routes and schedules. Clear labelling and visibility for scanning of barcodes and QR codes has an important role to play in this data journey – illegible or poorly-positioned labels will lead to precious data and time being lost, not to mention causing inconvenience for the all-important customer when items are needlessly mislaid or delayed.
Less packaging, less cost
Customers are demanding recyclable, returnable packaging – yes, because they care about the future of the environment, but also on a day-to-day practical level, because they are under their own pressures not to overfill waste collection bins in a world of many more parcels and fewer, more expensive waste collections. Parcel dimensions can be optimised using automated packaging and box systems to reduce box sizes and void fill. This has a positive impact on both postage costs and parcel capacity per delivery vehicle.
Meanwhile, it is a brutal fact that the high likelihood of costly returns has to be factored in and made easy for the customer in terms of both packaging and labelling. Indeed, 61 percent of customers said that a returns label was the most important aspect of a retailer’s returns policy.5
Next steps: work with trusted partners
To achieve resilience, retail decision-makers need to take a rounded view of the interplay between each facet of the delivery journey. A pinch-point during the warehouse process can lead to potentially costly ruptures in the last-mile. The winners will work with trusted technology partners at each stage of the parcel journey to give them the specialist tools to provide that all-important reliability and visibility – and priceless data to match.
Sources:
1 https://www.statista.com/statistics/286384/internet-share-of-retail-sales-monthly-in-the-united-kingdom-uk/
2 https://images.rbis-go.averydennison.com/Web/AveryDennisonCorporation/%7B4e8d8ddd-2a91-4eb8-baa0-0a5712b9dd9f%7D_digital-consumer-behaviour.pdf?elqTrack=true
3 https://www.bearingpoint.com/en-gb/our-success/insights/fine-tune-your-delivery-propositions/
4 https://www.colliers.com/en-gb/research#sort=%40datez32xpublished%20descending
5 https://www.sendcloud.co.uk/whitepapers/ecommerce-delivery-compass-2021/