Sorted

Graham & Brown, a leading British-made design led wallpaper, paint, and art company, faced significant challenges in their delivery management. With a rapidly growing ecommerce brand, the company was struggling with a single carrier delivery offering, which provided limited choice to customers at checkout. As the business expanded, the logistics operation was unable to keep up with the increasing demand for customer convenience. The process of onboarding new carriers was resource-intensive and cumbersome. The lack of a multi-carrier offering or a delivery management platform resulted in a lot of manual work in the warehouse. If customer orders needed changing, the label had to be cancelled and changed manually for each order, leading to customer frustration and inefficiencies.

3PL, a company providing warehousing, distribution, and carrier management for over 40 different retail businesses, was facing several challenges. They had been using the same delivery management platform for nearly a decade, which offered a single carrier delivery and required manual processes. This resulted in limited IT resources for carrier integration and customer frustration. As an ambitious business, 3PL needed to gear up for growth and futureproof their operations. They required a carrier and delivery management software that could fully enable expansion. The existing system was not only inefficient but also lacked a relationship with the supplier, leading to stagnation and acceptance of the status quo.

Party Delights, the UK's leading partyware retailer, faced several operational challenges. Despite having a delivery management system in place, the company was heavily reliant on a single supplier for shipping. This posed a significant risk as even a short period of downtime could result in a backlog of hundreds of orders, leaving the warehouse team idle. The company was also seeking to future-proof its operations and improve account management and support. The need for diversification of tech and mitigation of single points of failure, especially in business-critical operations like shipping, was paramount. The company's growth and the increase in online shopping meant more shipping, and the existing system was not equipped to handle the surge efficiently.

The retailer, a premier ethical brand in the UK's health, beauty, and cosmetics sector, was grappling with several challenges. Firstly, they were dissatisfied with their existing delivery management supplier due to long support times and frustrating communications, which strained their relationship. Secondly, the retailer was keen on realizing operational efficiencies and wanted to be agile enough to act on any improvement and optimization opportunities that arose. However, these opportunities remained unexplored due to the limitations of their delivery operations. Lastly, the retailer was striving to meet and exceed rising customer expectations in a world of constant change. They aimed to provide a flawless delivery experience, which was a challenge given the constant need to innovate and improve in the final mile of delivery.

The client, a globally recognized home electronics and beauty retailer, was facing several challenges in their direct-to-consumer (D2C) commerce model. Despite having a significant presence through concessions, resellers, and department stores, the brand was struggling to control the customer experience and increase sales through their own D2C ecommerce channel. The ecommerce customer journey was hampered by a clunky delivery experience, starting with a static checkout that displayed prescriptive delivery options. The fulfillment and logistics operation was not configured for global expansion, with complexities around multi-carrier consignment allocation. Furthermore, the brand was limited to a single carrier offering, and the lack of a dynamic checkout was negatively impacting the customer experience. Delivery was a sticking point for converting browsers to buyers, and basket conversion was a significant pain point.

The footwear brand, one of the largest manufacturers in the UK, was facing several challenges in its quest to become a digitally driven business. The company's traditional 'selling through catalogue' D2C culture was proving to be a hindrance in the digital age. The maintenance and development of different carrier integrations were expensive and resource-intensive due to the complex rules and changing requirements. The company lacked the necessary infrastructure to pivot or change in response to seasonal peaks and troughs, shifts in consumer behaviour, and industry disruption. This made it difficult for the retailer to adapt operations to meet customer promise and expand their operations for growth. Additionally, the teams had limited insights on carrier activity in real-time, often relying on historic data in third-party systems, making it difficult to monitor delivery performance.

The luxury fashion retailer was facing a multitude of challenges. With shipment volumes doubling during peak periods and plans for further international expansion, their existing direct carrier integration was no longer sufficient. The COVID-19 pandemic brought about sudden changes in customer behavior, leading to the closure of their high street stores, a strained central warehouse, and stock trapped in shops. The Brexit transition added to the complexity with new processes, roadblocks for international exports, and increased risk with no option to reroute deliveries. As more customers began shopping online, the brand's operations were not scalable enough to meet the growing customer expectations. They were also dealing with high carrier maintenance costs, too many manual processes, complex integrations, and a lack of real-time carrier data, making it difficult to adapt their operations quickly or gain key insights on the customer journey.

The food box subscription brand, shipping over 600,000 parcels per year, was facing several challenges. The operational processes were laborious and complex, resulting in high costs. The brand was struggling with maintaining integrations, adding new carriers, and manual processes such as label generation. Additionally, the booming meal kit delivery and subscription market was increasing customer demand, making it difficult for the brand to keep up with competitors while maintaining customer experience. The brand also lacked visibility of the customer journey, with limited access to real-time third-party data across the post-purchase customer journey. They struggled to get a view on carrier performance and lacked the key insights needed to seamlessly support customers with delivery.

The luxury fashion platform, with a decade-long history of connecting customers with thousands of brands, department stores, and independent boutiques worldwide, faced significant challenges in its shipping operations. The 'ship from anywhere' model, involving multiple locations in various countries, posed a daunting task in terms of efficiency and agility. The platform's technology capability, built entirely in-house, had supported its momentous growth. However, the next stage of growth required collaboration with a third-party supplier, a significant business decision that required careful consideration. Additionally, the platform aimed to diversify its carrier offerings to provide more options to customers. However, one-to-one carrier integration was time-consuming, expensive, and resource-intensive.

musicMagpie, a leader in the re-commerce of consumer technology, was facing challenges in managing customer experience during peak periods. The company was experiencing a surge in 'where is my order' (WISMO) calls, making it difficult to keep up with the demand. The customer shipping experience was largely owned by three carriers, resulting in a loss of brand engagement at crucial customer touchpoints. The in-house visibility of parcel tracking data and management of delivery exceptions was limited, often leading to the musicMagpie team learning about issues only when the customer contacted the customer service team or when they manually cross-referenced orders with carrier invoices at a later date. The rising volumes and complex delivery operations led to an increase in WISMO enquiries, putting additional pressure on the already busy customer service teams and risking the quality of customer experience.

N Brown, the home of JD Williams, Simply Be, Ambrose Wilson, and Jacamo, was facing challenges with their customer journey and brand experience. The company had launched the JD Williams app to serve their loyal customers in a smart way. However, eight months after the launch, they realized that the post-purchase experience needed more focus. The order tracking on the JD Williams app was limited and required complex developmental workarounds to make the content richer and the app more customer-friendly. The company was also relying on third-party carrier tracking sites, which led to a poor user experience as customers were redirected away from the app and the brand experience. Furthermore, there was a lack of visibility of user behavior, which was crucial for improving the app and the overall customer experience.

Wincanton, the largest British 3PL, was driven by customer satisfaction and innovation to expand their fulfilment tech offering. They were looking to strengthen their final mile tech roadmap and add extra value to fast-growth retailers. Despite having a strong hold on warehousing, fulfilment, logistics and distribution, Wincanton recognized the need for new technology to transform carrier management and post-purchase solutions for their customers. This would not only open up a new stream of revenue but also address customer challenges. The need for a partner was driven by customer needs, particularly the increasing demand for a competitive final mile, a factor that was causing concern for retailers.