When you think about starting an E-commerce or dropshipping business, then you are required to plan the strategies not only for selling the products but also to have the item in stock at that time and make it reach the customer at the earliest.
The latter part which starts from the moment of sale till the time it reaches that customer is covered in fulfilment services.
What Are 3pl Fulfilment Services?
3pl stands for third-party logistics. Their services typically cover everything from bringing your products from the manufacturer or wholesaler to their warehouse facility, stocking them for you, picking and packing them whenever you get an order, and shipping them to the customer. It’s up to the merchant to choose which services they want to use.
The customer may decide to hand over the products at the fulfilment service provider’s warehouse themselves. Likewise, they may choose to ship the products themselves to the customer.
However, good 3pl fulfilment center can give you such facilities that you need not raise your finger after forwarding the customer’s order to them.
Why choose 3pl fulfilment services?
3pl fulfilment services provide you with the entire state-of-the-art infrastructure for all your logistics requirements. You don’t need invest heavy amounts in storage facilities, administrative, and labor costs. Further, if you are doing drop shipping business then you need not invest even in the stock itself!
Thus you can focus solely on generating revenue ie. the sales and remain free from the hassles of stock management, administrative problems, and making shipping arrangements or dealing with sale return packages.
How a 3pl warehouse performs order fulfilment?
It’s a whole sequence of operations through which this typical process is performed. The following 6 steps define this procedure:
1. Sourcing and Receiving Inventory
Sourcing is the first step of inventory management in which manufacturers, retailers, or suppliers contact the 3PL companies. Goods come to the 3pl warehouse in bulk or fewer quantities from third parties for storage which are then inspected, labelled, and stored for future fulfilment.
In receiving phase, products are labelled using SKUs and bar codes to organize properly and for quick packing later.
2. Storing Inventory
After proper labelling, all the items are stored using the Warehouse management software and technologically advanced equipments. This reduces the manpower and increases efficiency. Products are stored as per short-term or long-term requirements. When the inventory is organized, it can be easily pick and pack in a minimum time.
3. Order Processing
Order processing is the process of receiving and processing new orders by customers every day. Whenever a product is sold at the merchant’s E-commerce portal, it forwards the order to the 3pl warehouse, either automatically by software or manually. Then starts the picking and packing part.
4. Pick & Pack
The pick and pack team then starts picking the items from respective bins and packing them as per packing slip instructions. The slips mention specific details about colour, size, type, etc. The SKUs and bar codes help in finding the exact matches without opening the packets.
One way to reduce costs on your shipments is through packing materials. Packing materials are typically selected by humans or robots to consolidate the package’s dimensions.
This includes the length, width, and height of the package. The result can be calculated using multiplication. If this measurement is optimized, the transportation of packages becomes faster and lowers the shipping cost.
5. Shipping
The packed boxes are then handed over to the shipping team or the shipping tie-up companies, who pick up the packages from fulfilment centres and deliver them to the customer at the earliest.
Any delay in these processes from receiving the order to shipping would lead to unsatisfied customers and even returns.
6. Handling of Returns
Such items are inspected carefully whether to restock them or discard them. Furthermore, the products are then sent back to the manufacturer, retailers, or recycling centres. It is a crucial process because you have to adjust refunds or replacements for the returned item.
How to choose a 3pl fulfilment services provider
When you pick a 3PL company, you shouldn’t just focus on the rates. Instead, you have to focus on “what services does the company provide”? How many of the services required by you can be handled by the 3pl Services Provider? How well can it manage my inventory? Does it offer special fulfilment services for my business?
Why choose CSG3PL fulfilment services
CSG3PL is a multimillion-dollar, 200+ employee company. CSG3PL offers scalable, flexible, and on-demand fulfilment and warehousing services. CSG3PL takes the worry out of your supply chain and allows you to focus on your business. We can scale your fulfilment needs up or down as needed. We take customer orders, pick, pack, and ship orders. We can manage inventory for you, including storage and replenishment of stock. We also handle returns and provide 24/7 support. Some of the salient features of CSG3PL are:
1. Best storage and design
The design of storage space is the key when it comes to warehouse logistics. It’s important to make the most of your available space and pack goods efficiently. This will prevent any items from being lost, even if the demand increases or when your business grows in the future.
CSG3PL uses the latest warehouse management software to manage the space as efficiently as possible to maximise storage capacity. Our proper racking system handles heavier items as we focus on every aspect of the products.
We have a dedicated separate storage environment for different category products & proper SKU is assigned to every product for automatic data entry.
2. Up-to-date cloud-based software
CSG3PL uses cloud-based software, with the help of which the inventory stored in different warehouses can be easily tracked with complete accuracy. Further, it keeps the stocks at the clients’ E-commerce software updated with the csg3pl stock positions.
This ensures smooth running of E-commerce operations by avoiding any overselling and keeping the shipments on time by quick packing. Further, our intelligent robots also facilitate picking and packing in our warehouses. So there is no chance of human error.
3. Customised packing
To add a more personal touch, we can laser-write a name on the product or we can pack the product in special packing supplied by the merchant.
4. Streamlined returns management
At our warehouses, our skilled and professional team of workers ensures a streamlined process for returns as well. We provide real-time reporting and analysis of the returned products. We inspect its quality and then put it forward to process the refund. Ultimately restocking is done in place of that item.
5. Product Disposal
The returned defective items or unwanted items are disposed of / recycled by us if requested by the merchant. We perform this destruction in a cost-effective and environment-friendly manner.
Our Melbourne 3pl warehouse gives us a cutting edge over others because of its location. There are a lot of other value-added services which make CSG3PL the best fit for companies of all sizes.
Conclusion:
Whether you are planning to start an E-Commerce / dropshipping business / Amazon FBA in Australia or already running one, then CSG3PL is the best fit for all your logistics and fulfilment requirements. Further, if you are looking for a fulfilment centre for your retail outlet in Australia then also your search ends here.