Warehouse

Gearing Up for Holiday Service

What’s the formula for a winning holiday strategy? It’s your marketing campaign plus your customer service....

Paper Wishes Takes On Its Own Fulfillment

Multichannel crafts merchant Paper Wishes in late 2007 thought it would be a good thing to bring its fulfillment closer to home by choosing a nearby outsourcer. But after a disastrous experience with a local third-party provider, the marketer last year decided to take charge its own fulfillment....

Getting DC Size Right

No multichannel marketer wants to be stuck with a distribution center that’s too small Excess capacity in a facility that’s too big is just as much of a problem. Just ask Lillian Vernon....

Have HEART, Operations Execs

During his session “Are We Ever Going To Get It Right,” at NCOF in Orlando, FL, last week, Hill educated attendees about the aspects of HEART, which stands for humanistic, ethical, agile/acquisitive, responsive/resilient, and targeted. These basic fundamentals, he said, can improve your company’s performance and spark fulfillment and delivery excellence. ...

American Eagle Outfitters on Cutting Labor Expenses

American Eagle Outfitters operates several distribution centers in North America, including a facility in Warrendale, PA, and a DC in Mississauga, Ontario, to service its Canadian stores. But the multichannel apparel merchant is most excited about its newest DC in Ottawa, KS, which is helping it reduce labor costs....

Keeping DC costs at bay

Need to cut costs? Who doesn't these days. While there's not much you can do about postage or paper prices, your DC is a prime area for reducing costs....

Surviving seasonal peaks

The holiday order crush—assuming you had one last year—may seem like a long time ago. But holiday 2008 is right around the corner, and seasonal peaks can be destructive to your distribution center without the right survival strategies, says operations expert Sam Flanders....

Warehouse KPIs: Who’s In Your “Fav Five?”

As a distribution professional, you have several key performance indicators you are always aware of. The operations and fulfillment field includes many KPIs--quantifiable measurements that reflect the success factors of an organization. But which warehouse KPIs are in your “Fav Five?” Here are mine, in descending order. ...

8 Things An ELS Vendor Will Never Tell You

A daily battle goes on in distribution centers and manufacturing plants all across the country between unmotivated workers and the supervisors that lead them. The supervisor wants them to work harder but typically isn’t sure how to make that happen. ...

Fairytale Brownies on seasonal staffing

Multichannel merchants typically have to have their holiday season staff in place before the fall. How do they do it? We asked Phoenix-based Fairytale...

Lifetime Brands consolidates operations with new DC

Lifetime Brands, a marketer/distributor of consumer home products, is taking over its own fulfillment with the opening of a new distribution center. The...

Tale of Two Facilities , Part Two

Last week we discussed the comparison of two distribution centers of the same corporation who followed the same approach to process improvement and labor management, but with very different results. ...

Managing Improvement: A Tale of Two Facilities

Johnson Stephens Consulting was engaged to assist the development of a labor management system for a multibillion-dollar corporation with two distribution centers. ...

Victoria's Secret's DC woes mount

Problems with its new distribution center continue to plague Victoria's Secret Direct. Because integration issues in the DC are preventing the women's apparel merchant from meeting expected volume, it is reducing catalog circulation to suppress demand....

Give me the Goods

Inventory is most likely the largest balance sheet asset in your company. How well you plan, purchase, and manage your inventory largely determines your...

Tips, How-To's, & Best Practices in....

GLOSSARY

When an industry term is on the tip of your tongue, or when you come across jargon that's new to you, the words and definitions you need may well be right here. Go to the warehouse glossary here.

Daily Special

ONLY ON MULTICHANNEL MERCHANT

COMMUNITY Thoughts and opinions from MultiChannel Merchant editors & columnists.

Back to Top