Warehouse effervescence appears to be at an all-time high, but online stores can still make minor adjustments to optimize operations and reduce costs. The year 2022 was marked by rising fuel prices, supply chain challenges, and shifting consumption habits. We don’t have a magic wand to solve your e-commerce needs during peak season, but we have some tips for you if you run an online business.

1. Monitor the news

Supply chain and logistics topics continue to dominate as carriers are forced to adjust prices due to fuel price changes. All of this can cause delays in the transportation of certain goods. Check for breaking news about inbound and outbound network outages. The information you receive from your 3PL provider is equally important. If a carrier is late or loads the wrong truck, it takes a team to handle it and know how to respond quickly to fix the problem. Every major event during this time period can have an impact on your last mile flow.

2. Form an internal team

A dedicated team can handle an unexpected situation and quickly establish company responses to changes in transportation or volumes. You will also be able to communicate with a 3PL partner. Whether you’re just organizing a group on Teams or have an email list, each of your core operational groups can work easily. Before you begin your holiday sales, designate someone to be in charge of creating next steps when problems arise and determining what you’re sending to customers and what you’re communicating internally.

3. Check inventory levels for packaging and tape

Most owners are typically concerned with inventory management, final preparations of goods, and SKUs for sale. However, it is possible that you will need to increase the number of goods and materials available for sale at the last minute. To meet these demands, you’ll need more packaging materials and tape to accommodate any potential growth. These items can be stored for an extended period of time, making excess inventory less of a concern. Consider what you’ll need to prepare and pack your orders, as well as what you’ll need to repackage the goods once they’ve been returned.

It also has backup units for these operations. This requires supplying a second barcode scanner, printer, labels, headsets, and other similar tools.

4. High-usage test systems

Before Black Friday and Cyber Monday, go over the tools you use to make sales and fill orders. To ensure that they can handle increased demand, test every process that customers and warehouse teams use. The goal is to identify potential issues that may have an impact on your sales as well as your ability to handle orders. Check that everything, including inventory connections, ordering tools, shopping carts, payment gateways, logistics planning, carrier selection, picking and packing tools, and everything else that is critical to your operations, is operationally sound.

5. Communicate delivery dates and times

Some products and goods necessitate discussions with your carriers and customers. One of the best examples is the cutoff deadlines you use to ensure that all orders arrive on time. Courier companies will post this information on their websites, but you should confirm these details with the carrier ahead of time. Check every operator and service you use so you can notify customers on time. You can also include a special disclaimer on checkout pages or shopping carts where customers select and check their shipping options.

Conclusion

Some businesses will discover that problems and changes grow too large to deal with early on. In these cases, you can contact a 3PL provider to see what kind of emergency support they can offer, and you might find a partner who can pick up some of your inventory or handle certain orders at nearby facilities. To speed up processes, local carriers can transport goods to a 3PL warehouse. If you’re concerned about how you’ll get through this e-commerce peak season and require last-minute assistance, you can use a service like Simplify to help you find the best last-minute solutions for your business.