E-warehousing.co.uk

[storagewoman]

I would like to ask you for your comments on what you need from an order fulfillment company. We launched in september and would like to hear about your experiences good or bad with your warehouse facilities.

We offer an order fulfillment solution for small to medium sized businesses. We store your goods, pick them, pack them then dispatch them. Our 35,000 sq ft warehouse facility is equipped with the latest bar code track and trace systems ensuring accurate fulfillment of your orders. We can link your shop with our systems or process the orders manually. We offer great courier rates to dispatch your goods too.

We are trying to promote our service and it would be great to recieve some help and advise from you guys.

Lucy

 

[GreenLaser]

Lucy

I like your website name , pretty cool ........ the login button on the website seems to be in wrong place !

One thing thats missing for me is pictures of the actual warehouse ..i think potential cusotmers ould liek to see that ..so they know it exiists and its wind watertight etc .... also with 35,000 Sq ft ... a 2 ft shelf sems a bit stingy

 

[storagewoman]

Hi Gordon
yes thanks for that.
We are developing the promotional material at the moment as we are exhibiting at spring fair in feb. I have taken photos of the warehouse etc and will get the web guy to include them on the site.
The shelf is 10ft by 2ft by 3ft so you can get alot of stuff on it. 2 pallets can fit on.
We have a quarter of the warehouse shelved, the rest is pallet, containers and open storage. We can offer different packages depending on whatever the person/company requires.

Lucy

 

[wezza]

I would be interested to know about how you handle returns, whether popular shopping carts can be integrated with your fulfilment centre, how many packages can be pick and shipped in the 1 hour included etc.

 

[storagewoman]

I would be interested to know about how you handle returns, whether popular shopping carts can be integrated with your fulfilment centre, how many packages can be pick and shipped in the 1 hour included etc


In response to the above post. We have a quarrentine system which allows products back into store for re-evaluation initially by ourselves or you the customer. (this is agreed by the customer at the commencement of business). Goods that are marketable can be re-introduced into stock for resale. Other items can be written off and a replacement policy can be implemented.

With regards to the shopping carts. We can receive manual or automated orders. We can accept them on an excel spreadsheet or your website can be linked through - this can be done with our web expert. The websites will be intergrated by a link / special code that will feed the information to our webserver and then will be activated onto our back office system.

Our service is based on £15 an hour. Depending on what the parcel is and what packing etc needs to be done depends how fast it takes. The first hour includes delivery and inspection of any of your goods inward and checking your parcels. All timings are monitored by the second on our bar code guns. All your stock is recorded and you have access to the back office system so you can see all your stock levels and orders in one place.

Lucy Davison
Sales and marketing manager
E-warehousing.co.uk

 

[strikingedge]

On the website....

1. The homepage main images aren't clickable but look like they should be.
2. There's no call to action - to get you to register, get a quote, give you a call etc etc
3. The profile page lit up every alarm bell, it is obvious that your old company has gone under. I wouldn't trust my stock to a company that might be in financial difficulties and I don't care about your work experience roles. I would suggest rewriting it to emphasise the highly capable *team* and their extensive international logistics experience.

On the business side, and what's important....

1. You need to offer predictable packing timelines - if I run a store that offers next day, you need to pick within an hour and dispatch.

2. Delivery. People are wise to Interparcel and Parcel2Go and other shipping aggregators. Your courier services would have to be competitive and I'd be annoyed to see the fulfilment partner making money off my delivery costs.

For a lot of retailers shipping lowish value items in high volume, couriers aren't really the way to go.

Tracking with Royal Mail is awful unless Special Delivery, can you offer UK Mail?

3. Some stock is perishable - do you have policies to ship oldest stock first?

4. Sometimes products have to be put into kits - e.g. Christmas bundles, travel kits etc. Can companies ship products for you to package appropriately for the same cost?

5. I don't want to be hit by unexpected fees. My preference is working out a deal based on projections....if they are wide of the mark as judged over a few months, then it gets renegotiated...but I don't suddenly want a monthly bill to jump from £500 to £10K - the costs need to be stable and predictable.

6. Tracking....couldn't see a reference to it. It is crucial the merchant has all the available information to be able to talk to the customer if something goes wrong.

7. Integrations and back office - need to see more info, ideally a video demo or screen shots. I worked with a fulfillment company that offered 24 hour access, but in reality its systems were so dreadful, we had to call up beforehand to let them know we were going to attempt to access it.

8. Pricing & Signup page makes no sense to me. I thought you were offering warehouse fulfillment services and instead you're going to build my website and charge me £60 a month for a shelf and an hour of picking time?

I don't know how many products you can pick in an hour - I only want to know how many shipments you will get out at what cost - and personally, I don't really want to pay for space or storage. The real cost driver is the staff who pick and pack - but that's your issue not mine - I only care about shipments.

And....despite it being a sign-up page there was no option to sign-up.

I've been as critical as I can to help out - I think if you can get the pricing model sorted and can offer various guarantees about service, then you could have a really cool business.

 

[FreelanceSoftwareDeveloper]

I'm also very interested to hear the response to the questions above.

As a small business owner I could see this kind of service being a viable option if I am able to expand as opposed to paying rates on my own warehouse and employing staff.

The delivery time issue is key, this is what really makes or break this type of service for me. Is there a cut off at which you can guarantee same day despatch.

There doesn't appear to be any mention of packing material costs, jiffy bags, boxes etc. Is this all inclusive?

I've registered my details on the site for more info.

 

[4little1s]

Sounds very interesting, am interested in finding out more.

 

[myoriginalhome]

Yes this is an interesting alternative to having your own warehousing and staff - I think you should consider the pricing approach though.

If its an hourly rate then I think it will be very difficult for your customers to estimate costs and build that into their own pricing/forecasts.

Some people may also worry there isn't an incentive for you to be efficient if you get paid per hour rather than for the actual task (i.e. per dispatch).

 

[Jeff FV]

An interesting concept and I'm glad you've made me aware of it.

Our business has grown from nothing to something over the last year and, having started as a kitchen table start up, we still have boxes of stock in all corners of the house and do all our picking and packing ourselves.

However things are growing and at some point we will be faced with the (welcome!) problem of having to take on premises, if only to store stock.

Your business could be one option and one that I'd certainly investigate. I suspect there will be lots of micro & small business's in a similar position. For your own marketing, it might be useful to provide some figures that compare the cost of being with you (basically storage & stock picking and dispatch) with hiring our own storage solution (storage only.)

I think that if you can show that the differential of being with you is small (which it could be, given that you could use your storage facility more efficiently than a small business hiring a small facility) then you could be on to a winner.

I'll certainly store (forgive the pun!) your details for future reference.

Jeff

 

[seobarbershop]

Also in addition to the above - What I think would be a really good selling tool for your website and at the same time a really useful infromation 'giver' to a customer like myself would be to have an example of the process and costs involved for a current customer. I.E;

Scott runs an online store on ebay selling books. It costs Scott 'X' amount a month for this typre of service. Included in the he gets X,Y and Z. This allows Soctt to (List of benefits).


Just an idea.. That would be useful for myself.

Wellcome to the forum and goodluck with everything

 

[strikingedge]

A price comparison with Shipwire (if you're cheaper!) would also be useful.

 

[GreenLaser]

Epic Cvs ... that seems like a VERY good idea

 

[storagewoman]

Hi
I have taken on board everything thats been said and am in the process of changing the website to explain what we can do etc and a bit about our extensive experience. The previous international company was sold and we have been trading as a storage company for over 10 years. We have devoloped the e-warehousing.co.uk concept over the last 2 years. We have racked a quarter of the warehouse for it and have had a bespoke computer package made to support it. Corporate style order processing for small businesses.

I am going to respond to WhiskyFive's questions and statements in order which as many of you have said will be interested in seeing the answers. Here go's!!!

Website

1. The Homepage main images will be clickable in the next few days. We are at present changing the page to make this possible.

2. The call to action is on every page and has now got a space to give us the relevant info we need to contact you.

3. The profile page will be changed. Seeing it from someone elses eyes I can see how you came to thet conclusion but I have addressed the answer in the introduction.

Business side

1. Picking and Packing - We start processing the orders as soon as they come in. They will be dispatched the same day. We can work weekends and shiftwork when applicable with advance notice. Our standard cut-off time is 3pm as the courier comes at 4pm, however, we are flexible and will endeavour to accomodate orders as late as possible. Depending on volumes and urgency - we are prepared to deliver to the couriers hub.

2. Delivery - In a general answer to your question We have very competitive courier/postal rates and are happy to offer complete like for like service with your existing couriers/ postal supplier if you prefer. All our deliveries are on a 24 hr service B to B or 48 Hour service B to C. We keep the costs as low as we can. I am not posting any rates here but if you want a quote I will answer any personal queries.

3. Perishables and use by dates - We store the stock in date order with the closest dates always used first. We will stock rotate accordingly. We do this already for Hampers by Design who have gluten free and sugar free products with sell by dates.

4. Kit and Assembly work - We already do kit and assembly work. One of the jobs we are currently doing is for a company in the oil industry. We have have 8 different components to put in a briefcase style box. 2 different pads have indentifiable serial no's on (these need to be recorded). 2 other items need to have 50 of each counted and there is 1 item that is unique to each box. We have to report at the end of the month as to which pads have gone in which box and which unique item it relates to and been sent to whom! We have to send 400 out by the 1st of each month with a weeks window.

5. Fees - It is possible to negotiate percentage turnover linked deals where possible. This is based on the information supplied by our customers. We can provide tailor-made solutions to meet any customers requirements.

6. Tracking - Tracking in the warehouse through our barcode system is totally transparent to our customers.
Consignment tracking is simple. As we create a consignment a tracking number is generated and automatically forwarded to the customer for them to keep a track of their goods.

7. Intergrations and Back Office - We will work on doing a video or screen shots thank you for the suggestion.
The back office system is password protected through a web portal giving our customers complete access to their own files with the ability to add stock and file orders. We have spent alot of effort in this department and consider it the cornerstone of our operation.

8. Pricing and sign up - This will change today and a better explanation put in. Our £60 package is a start off point. Larger orders are tailormade to your requirements.

9. Pick volumes - Obviously pick volumes and consignment rates vary for every customer and this is only a guide. Most customers have some idea of the volume rate per hour for picking and consignment consolidation.

I am most grateful for your constructive criticism and hopefully I have addressed all the issues. Please contact me if you would like a quote for anything you would like us to help with. If you are ever in the kenilworth/ Coventry area please let me know and I will take you out for a pub lunch by way of thanking you for your valuable advise.

 

[storagewoman]

I'm also very interested to hear the response to the questions above.

As a small business owner I could see this kind of service being a viable option if I am able to expand as opposed to paying rates on my own warehouse and employing staff.

The delivery time issue is key, this is what really makes or break this type of service for me. Is there a cut off at which you can guarantee same day despatch.

There doesn't appear to be any mention of packing material costs, jiffy bags, boxes etc. Is this all inclusive?

I've registered my details on the site for more info.

We start processing the orders as soon as they come in. They will be dispatched the same day. We can work weekends and shiftwork when applicable with advance notice. Our standard cut-off time is 3pm as the courier comes at 4pm, however, we are flexible and will endeavour to accomodate orders as late as possible. Depending on volumes and urgency - we are prepared to deliver to the couriers hub.

Packaging materials will be charged at cost plus 5%. If we are not competitive (we will always strive to be!) we will change to your supplier if it offers a like for like service. This applies to consumerbles and postal/courier service.

We will also happily use your bespoke packaging.

 

[storagewoman]

Sounds very interesting, am interested in finding out more.

I hope the above post answers all your questions. I or Paul will ring you later to have a chat. Thanks for your email for more info!
Lucy

 

[storagewoman]

Yes this is an interesting alternative to having your own warehousing and staff - I think you should consider the pricing approach though.

If its an hourly rate then I think it will be very difficult for your customers to estimate costs and build that into their own pricing/forecasts.

Some people may also worry there isn't an incentive for you to be efficient if you get paid per hour rather than for the actual task (i.e. per dispatch).

We will discuss any project and evaluate particular charges but it must be based on the knowlege you have on your products and whats involved to execute the fulfillment of an order.
Lucy

 

[storagewoman]

An interesting concept and I'm glad you've made me aware of it.

Our business has grown from nothing to something over the last year and, having started as a kitchen table start up, we still have boxes of stock in all corners of the house and do all our picking and packing ourselves.

However things are growing and at some point we will be faced with the (welcome!) problem of having to take on premises, if only to store stock.

Your business could be one option and one that I'd certainly investigate. I suspect there will be lots of micro & small business's in a similar position. For your own marketing, it might be useful to provide some figures that compare the cost of being with you (basically storage & stock picking and dispatch) with hiring our own storage solution (storage only.)

I think that if you can show that the differential of being with you is small (which it could be, given that you could use your storage facility more efficiently than a small business hiring a small facility) then you could be on to a winner.

I'll certainly store (forgive the pun!) your details for future reference.

Jeff

Undoubtedly we can help you and other micro businesses aswell as small to medium businesses. We offer fulfillment packages at very reasonable costs and also storage only. If you would like a quote please let me know. I cant put costs and figures on here!
Lucy

 

[storagewoman]

Also in addition to the above - What I think would be a really good selling tool for your website and at the same time a really useful infromation 'giver' to a customer like myself would be to have an example of the process and costs involved for a current customer. I.E;

Scott runs an online store on ebay selling books. It costs Scott 'X' amount a month for this typre of service. Included in the he gets X,Y and Z. This allows Soctt to (List of benefits).


Just an idea.. That would be useful for myself.

Wellcome to the forum and goodluck with everything

Here goes! Lucy - (thats me! ) sells Gluten Free and Sugar free products. She has orders coming in from the markets she sells at and also from ebay and her own online store. She pays £60 a month and for that gets access to the online back office system that monitors her orders that have come automatically from ebay (this is linked by a thing called an ebay token!) and her webshop is linked by a special code that her web provider and our web man provided. She does not have to do a thing as it is fully automated. She can manually input the orders from the market in the back office system so the warehouse can send them straight out.
When a delivery is coming in to the warehouse she can go in and input what, when and who the delivery is coming from with the products expected. The warehouse will check the stock when it comes in. The products are put onto the barcode system then allocated storage area(this is also bar coded so the warehouse knows where the product is located).
At anytime she can check her stock levels.
She has a shelf 10ft x 2ft by 3ft. Which stores all her stock. It gives her 1 hour labour and all this for £60 per month. She has not gone over the 1 hour yet as it is calculated on the barcode gun by the second.
She has 10 to 20 packages going out per week varying from single packets of sweets to Hampers.

I hope that gives you an insight into what we can do and what good value it is.

 

[Ambanja Pictures]

On the website....

1. The homepage main images aren't clickable but look like they should be.
2. There's no call to action - to get you to register, get a quote, give you a call etc etc
3. The profile page lit up every alarm bell, it is obvious that your old company has gone under. I wouldn't trust my stock to a company that might be in financial difficulties and I don't care about your work experience roles. I would suggest rewriting it to emphasise the highly capable *team* and their extensive international logistics experience.

On the business side, and what's important....

1. You need to offer predictable packing timelines - if I run a store that offers next day, you need to pick within an hour and dispatch.

2. Delivery. People are wise to Interparcel and Parcel2Go and other shipping aggregators. Your courier services would have to be competitive and I'd be annoyed to see the fulfilment partner making money off my delivery costs.

For a lot of retailers shipping lowish value items in high volume, couriers aren't really the way to go.

Tracking with Royal Mail is awful unless Special Delivery, can you offer UK Mail?

3. Some stock is perishable - do you have policies to ship oldest stock first?

4. Sometimes products have to be put into kits - e.g. Christmas bundles, travel kits etc. Can companies ship products for you to package appropriately for the same cost?

5. I don't want to be hit by unexpected fees. My preference is working out a deal based on projections....if they are wide of the mark as judged over a few months, then it gets renegotiated...but I don't suddenly want a monthly bill to jump from £500 to £10K - the costs need to be stable and predictable.

6. Tracking....couldn't see a reference to it. It is crucial the merchant has all the available information to be able to talk to the customer if something goes wrong.

7. Integrations and back office - need to see more info, ideally a video demo or screen shots. I worked with a fulfillment company that offered 24 hour access, but in reality its systems were so dreadful, we had to call up beforehand to let them know we were going to attempt to access it.

8. Pricing & Signup page makes no sense to me. I thought you were offering warehouse fulfillment services and instead you're going to build my website and charge me £60 a month for a shelf and an hour of picking time?

I don't know how many products you can pick in an hour - I only want to know how many shipments you will get out at what cost - and personally, I don't really want to pay for space or storage. The real cost driver is the staff who pick and pack - but that's your issue not mine - I only care about shipments.

And....despite it being a sign-up page there was no option to sign-up.

I've been as critical as I can to help out - I think if you can get the pricing model sorted and can offer various guarantees about service, then you could have a really cool business.

Hope its ok to post this here - If you are looking to make a video demo we are a corporate production company. Please contact me (check my profile) for more info if you are interested

 

[storagewoman]

Thanks for all your replies. Have taken everything on board and am now changing the website. I have changed our promotional material too.

Lucy
e-warehousing.co.uk
store, order, pick, pack and dispatch

 

[storagewoman]

We have been doing this for a couple of months now and have many customers! Its working really well. Thanks to everyone for their input and encouragement!

 

[deniser]

Can you deal with clothing on rails too?

Do you have the facility for checking goods for damage that come in and go out?

 

[Feltshop]

Why not have 100% transparent prices? All I could find was the 60pounds/month quote.

It'd make it that much more effective and efficient when choosing between order fulfilment companies - in fact, I am doing that just now, trying to pick the company that I'd like to work with. More transparency (all prices laid out, no need to send emails for quotes or call any agents) - more chances that you'll get my business, even if it is more expensive than your competitors. Notice how ebay and amazon have ALL their fees laid out straight? Transparency does wonders.

Or at the very least, you could calculate some sample quotes. One for small goods (jewellery, souvenirs), one for medium size (clothes) and one for large products (home appliances, furniture). That way, your potential customers will know the costs involved.

Just my 2p worth...

 

[storagewoman]

Every person has a different way of working.

We offer the £60 a month package which is for storage on a 10ft x 2ft x 3ft shelf. 1 hour a month pick pack time and 24/7 access to your back office stock control system.

It is very difficult to quote a pick pack rate as every customer is different. We are transparent with our prices but we cant be general with costings as no 2 quotes are the same. We will quote you a costing when we know what volumes you do, how many sku's you have, how much storage it will take up. How many hours it takes to pick etc etc.

Its not as simple as you think! Hope you allow us to give you a quote.

Lucy

 

[storagewoman]

Can you deal with clothing on rails too?

Do you have the facility for checking goods for damage that come in and go out?

Yes we do , thanks for contacting me. Quote winging its way to you today!

 

[THL Mag]

Are you an accredited fulfilment house with the DMA's Response & Fulfilment Council?

 

[storagewoman]

I have looked into it since reading your post. It is not compulsory and it is like an organisation. We are members of the giftware association on their suppliers list.

Thanks for asking and I will apply to be an associate member as we are a new business.

Lucy

 

[s00nice]

Interesting business you have going.
Could be useful once I move to England and start my planned webshops.

Will bookmark the webpage and save contact info.

 

[THL Mag]

I have looked into it since reading your post. It is not compulsory and it is like an organisation. We are members of the giftware association on their suppliers list.

Thanks for asking and I will apply to be an associate member as we are a new business.

Lucy

I know it's not compulsory Lucy; I was a founder member of the DMA's Response & Fulfilment Council, I sat on the Committee of the Council for 7 years and have acted as an inspector for the Council looking at Handling Houses wanting to sign up to the accreditation.
If you are serious about following the Code of Practice (which all Handling Houses should be) I suggest that you contact the Council and speak to them about the measures, checks and procedures that you should have in place.
If you're already doing everything you need to it should be straight forward. Teamwork Handling have been in the promotional handling and fulfilment business for twenty years but I still found the Council extremely useful.

All the best

Magnus

 

[storagewoman]

Interesting business you have going.
Could be useful once I move to England and start my planned webshops.

Will bookmark the webpage and save contact info.

Hi
We deal with overseas customers and it works well for them. Why wait till you get here!
Look forward to hearing from you when you start your online retailing!
Lucy

 

[storagewoman]

We are looking for companies who are struggling with trying to keep up with everyday life and keeping an online retail business up and running.
If anyone knows anyone that would like to get their life back can you PM me please.
Thanks
Lucy