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Looking at Ecommerce Returns in a New Light

| Mike O'Brien

While ecommerce returns continue to soar and cost retailers both in terms of actual dollars and the bad customer experience, there are practical ways to reduce the rate, make the process more efficient and leverage the customer opportunity, attendees were told at the NRF 2023 Big Show in New York.

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Ecommerce Headwinds A-Blowing, Are You Ready?

| Frank Garcia

In 2023, brand success means streamlining shipping and fulfillment, in tandem with expanding omnichannel availability, to reach and delight shoppers. You need to be “omnipresent,” looking to the future and planning ahead while staying connected and delivering satisfying experiences to customers across all touchpoints.

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Supply Chain Jobs: Why Zoomers, Millennials Don’t Love Them

| Gabe Grifoni

Ask a millennial (the generation born between 1981 and 1997) or Gen Z (born between 1997-2015) to name his or her top 5 exciting and rewarding careers, and there is a strong chance that a supply chain professional isn’t going to be on that list. Here’s how to overcome this recruitment roadblock and attract the next generation of talent.

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The Supply Chain Continues to Be the Story

| Mike O'Brien

In 2020, every consumer who had been the beneficiary of a mysterious apparatus called the supply chain to magically whisk goods to their door suddenly became aware it existed. In 2022, supply chain doings still dominated headlines as shippers, carriers and suppliers continued to grapple with myriad issues.

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Warehouse Space Demand Will Shrink in 2023

| Mike O'Brien

Demand for warehouse space will decrease in 2023, experts predicted, but companies will still be looking to fill in network gaps opportunistically, while continuing to move sourcing and inventory closer to domestic customers to hedge against supply chain shocks. Consolidation of the 3PL sector is expected to continue.

Supply Chain, Sustainability Tools: Working in Tandem

| John Rattay

Shippers know they must prioritize sustainability to remain competitive and align with customer demands. They also know that they must leverage technology to measure their company’s supply chain carbon impacts accurately and set attainable sustainability goals. To solve this, they need to break out of traditional ways of doing things.

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Freight Consortium Looks to Create API Standards

| Mike O'Brien

A freight consortium made up of J.B. Hunt, Uber Freight and Convoy is looking to create an industry standard for using application programming interface (API) connections to share data among partners in order to solve freight scheduling challenges, initially addressing full truckload (TL).

Mitigating Supply Chain Disruption for SMBs

| Shalabh Singhal

A lot has changed since the onset of the pandemic but supply chain disruptions continue to evolve. While the degree and nature of disruptions differed for every company, almost all discovered many hidden supply chain imbalances. Here are a few ways SMBs can make the best of these turbulent times and keep things humming.

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Walmart Posts Strong Q3, Ecommerce Up 16%

| Mike O'Brien

Walmart gave the retail sector a much-needed pre-peak season shot in the arm, especially following Amazon’s recent miss, posting better-than-expected Q3 sales and adjusted earnings, as its low-priced grocery business soared and ecommerce revenue grew 16%. Three billion of the loss was from a settlement of opioid litigation.

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The Parcel Industry in the Age of Disruption

| Bill Knasinski

The situation in the parcel industry — high shipping rates, increased surcharges and shipping delays — is a convergence of many complex issues, including supply/demand imbalance, a rough economy and geopolitical woes. Let’s take a closer look at how ecommerce and government laws have disrupted supply chains.