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 5 Steps to Shape-Based Postage Compliance
By: by Bob Makofsky
You've probably heard that the U.S. Postal Service has filed to raise rates again in May 2007. But the proposed rates follow a more complex pricing structure than the flat 5.4% increase implemented last January. For the first time, the rate structure will rely on shape, as well as weight. ...
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Thinking of Relocating Your DC? Consider These 5 Factors
By: By Curt Barry
Is your distribution center cramped? Or do you think you might save substantially on your outbound shipping costs by moving into a DC? A warehouse relocation may be just the thing for you. But before you go breaking ground or signing lease papers there are factors worthy of consideration: inbound transportation costs; labor cost, availability and peak staffing needs; facilities costs; state and local government incentives; and risk evaluation to your business. Marketers must evaluate all these factors to see how they impact the total savings or costs for the potential move....
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Securing Global Supply Chains: Seven Reasons Why "Getting It Done" Is So Hard
By: By Ralph Welborn and Vince Kasten
We all know that a company's global supply chain is a potent strategic weapon, economically speaking. Unfortunately, it can also be a potentially fatal area of vulnerability. Consider the hundreds of millions of shipping containers that move among the world's seaports--about 80% of the world's cargo, which adds up to 5.8 billion tons per year--and you can see that there is a lot of room for error. ...
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Ay Carrumba! Eleventh-Hour Debate Over Parcel Rates Could Kill Postal Reform
By: By Mark Del Franco
As the House and the Senate mull the merits of enacting postal reform, it appears that 11th-hour lobbying efforts brought by private-sector package delivery firms over parcel rates could threaten postal reform, according to Jerry Cerasale, senior vice president of government affairs for the Direct Marketing Association in Washington....
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Lake Champlain Chocolates Moving to Greener Pastures
By: By Mark Del Franco
Lake Champlain Chocolates in October is moving its packaging, warehousing, and shipping divisions into a building down the street from its Burlington, VT, headquarters. Not only is the new 47,000 sq. ft.- location more than double the size of its old distribution center, it's also a whole lot greener....
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Flight Simulators for Contact Centers
By: By Kathryn Jackson
Recently I asked several contact center managers, "How prepared are your agents to handle the job immediately following initial training?” The answers ranged from “barely” to “more than 60%.” Many managers said there was no way to prepare them adequately: Agents simply have to get on the phone and experience what it is like. ...
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Four Steps to Internal Benchmarking
By: By Kate Vitasek
Benchmarking is the process of drawing meaningful comparisons between a company’s performance and the performance of identified best practices. For many companies, these known best practices can become a beacon for continuous improvement, pointing employees to better ways to get things done. ...
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The Skinny on “Amputated” Coaching
By: By Kathryn Jackson
You may already know where your coaching gaps are in the contact center. If you don’t, there’s a good chance they are either between performance feedback and educating or between educating and modeling, since these are the most commonly recognized gaps in contact centers. We call these gaps stage-one and stage-two amputations. ...
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Separate but Equal: Warehouse and Labor Management Systems
By: By Don Cook
Recent advances in warehouse management systems (WMS) and time and attendance (T&A) systems provide many benefits in inventory control, distribution operations, and personnel administration. They also provide an opportunity to obtain files that you can use to comply with certain labor management requirements. But though labor management is a key means of cutting costs and improving service, it is usually given a low priority during implementation of WMS and T&A systems. ...
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The Ins and Outs of Conveyor-Based Zone Picking
By: By Sam Flanders
Conveyor-based zone picking can dramatically improve operational performance in certain situations. It works by separating an order into two or more distinct picking zones and having the conveyor control system determine what zones the order needs to visit. It is most often used with a shipping carton or tote, traveling on a conveyor system. ...
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WMS by the Numbers
By: By Rene Jones
Warehouses are built around numbers —the facility’s square footage, how many rows of racking it takes to stock the number of SKUs, the amount of orders processed through a facility in a day. In their marketing materials, warehouse management system (WMS) providers discuss all sorts of numbers. But there are other numbers that you won’t see in their marketing brochures or advertisements that you should nonetheless keep in mind before buying and implementing a system. ...
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Are You Outsourcing?
By: By Debra Ellis
The debate over international outsourcing is passionate. With protectionists and free trade advocates drawing battle lines. Isn’t ironic that neither side ever mentions domestic outsourcing to customers? Since the 1970s, when consumers gladly pumped their own gas to save a few pennies, companies have been outsourcing service positions to their customers. The proliferation of e-commerce has contributed to a significant reduction of service positions in established corporations. ...
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Customize Dashboards for Individual Needs
By: By Sam Flanders
You should create multiple "dashboards" in your facility, signs or screens each customized with metrics and information for a particular audience. Senior management will be most interested in getting a view of how the entire facility is doing....
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Nordstrom To Expand Cedar Rapids DC
Seattle-based cataloger/retailer Nordstrom said on Aug. 29, it plans to expand its Cedar Rapids, IA-based fulfillment and contact centers. The expansion will coincide with the company's updating of its direct business' inventory systems. ...
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IT Budgets to Grow Over Security Concerns
Marketers are expected to show IT budget and capital expenditure growth in 2006, according to the third annual Retail IT Budgeting Study conducted by the National Retail Federation and AMR Research. ...
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M&A: Contact Center Deal Tops Teleservices
Quadrangle Group and Thomas H. Lee Partners' $3.3 billion joint buyout of West Corp. (at nine times earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) was the largest teleservices transaction during the second quarter of 2006 and accounted for 68% of the sector's transaction value during the period, according to New York-based investment bank Petsky Prunier, which tracks merger and acquisition activity for marketers as well as market service firms.
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Ecometry, GERS Merge
By: By Mark Del Franco
Delray Beach, FL-based software solutions provider Ecometry on Aug. 21 merged with San Diego-based GERS Retail Systems to form Escalate Retail, a $100 million company with about 400 employees and 650 clients. ...
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A New Look at the Contact Center's Top 20 Metrics
By: By Penny Reynolds
The evolution of a simple call center into a multichannel contact center doesn’t happen overnight. You may need to add or upgrade technologies, and certainly staff skills will need to expand ...
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