Business of 3pl
/ By Karan Mudliar / Blog • Uncategorized/ • • • • / 0 Comments

Aligning your Business with 3PL

In today’s competitive, tight, and cut-throat business environment, many companies depend on third party logistics (3PL) for their supply chain management in order to reduce costs, improve efficiencies, and ensure smooth operations of their distribution and fulfilment service requirements.

To deliver value and thrive within a difficult market, 3PL providers need to align closely with their parent businesses in terms of mission, vision, and goals.  As the relationship is so significant, most big businesses have well-defined 3PL processes, systems, quality standards, performance, criteria, and best practices already in place and regularly keep a close eye on operations.

In fact, most business are keen to look to partner with vendors who will align and integrate with their own processes and practices. Thus, in a totally aligned relationship, the supply chain “shadows” the processes of the parent company and replicates the parent company’s processes, adheres to their standards, mimics their operating models and becomes an “extension” of the parent company. It is even true to say that they may become fully embedded into the parent company and a “well-coordinated arm” of the parent company.

As this relationship requires careful selection many parent companies have strict and stringent supply chain selection criteria, which they use to screen their supply chain partners. In some cases companies may also train supply chain providers in their best practices and operating procedures to ensure that the vendors understand their business priorities and their own way of operating.

Some companies also craft a strategic plan for the alignment and for the relationship, describing the capabilities that they wish their partner supply chain to develop at different stages of the relationship. These capabilities could be operational, technological, or behavioural.

In order to maintain a sound relationship it can help to carefully define the work flows at the parent-supply chain interface as well as specific goals, outcomes, and expectations. It may also be beneficial to define the responsibilities of the parent company and that of the vendor that may include responsibilities for effort, for job, for the entire system, and for business outcomes.

Wroking in business of 3pl

Sharing performance benchmarks and baselines with the supply chain vendor and of clear unambiguous expectations can also help both parties understand what is expected in terms of performance.

Aligning may also entail integration with a company’s web servers, applications and electronic data interchange standards. This allows for seamless information flow and exchange and utilisation of information between the parent’s business and the supply chain.

Such an integration would allow a 3PL partner to use this information to track and trace shipments and direct this information to the parent company’s website; thus, providing customers with the vital information they need as well as helping to improve customer satisfaction.

Of course, there is the obvious check on physical integration, which ensures that the 3PL has the capabilities to manage the business in questions. Here, some internal questions to be answered could include: “What modes of transportation and what services will you [the business or parent company] need?” “What volumes do you plan to ship and where?” “Do you have specific security or visibility requirements?” and “Are your shipments time-sensitive?” Though these are basic questions given the nature of the business they will be able to filter many potential 3PL providers, which may not be suitable.

Also, the 3PL should be capable of matching the specific needs of the business. Many providers have a variety of strengths and weakness and it is imperative that those most closely aligned to the business’s requirements are at the forefront of its strengths. If the business relies on door-to-door deliveries, intra-warehouse, or last-mile, it is important to understand that the 3PL is on par with this and its strength lie in a particular area.

Additionally, it may be necessary to check on the number of modes the 3PL provider actually has and utilises. The four common modes – rail, road, sea, and air – may be a given on paper by a 3PL but it is wise to ensure that the inter modal services being offered have the right size or fleet as well as hands-on experience to be properly handled.

Further, businesses must undertake thorough research about possible 3PLs prior to confirmation. Reputation, reliability, and responsiveness are key, especially in the logistics and supply chain arena. Also, businesses may opt to review use cases or examples within various scenarios to confirm the handling of specific situations by 3PLs. There must also be a cultural fit and the agreed recognition and understanding of the appropriate protocol, procedures, and hierarchy cannot be understated.

Finally, though clearly a given many businesses fail to check a 3PL’s customer service record. Given the scope for disruptions across the supply chain, the crisis management capabilities or the reputation of the company needs to be maintained and carefully managed. To this end it is paramount that the 3PL knows the plan of action, can ensure regular flow of goods or services, and does not lose control during a crisis.

As businesses rely more heavily on 3PLs getting the right fit to align with both business needs and present-day demands is not an easy feat. Many partnerships have failed, especially when a business has recently moved from one party to another. In this regard and given the high demands on the relationship, both parties need to be on the “same page” prior to any business commitments.

With reduced costs and improved customer service being key in the high-contested logistics marketplace, both businesses and 3PLs require a synergy that can be secure, reliable, and potentially long term. There must be clear and concise dialogue prior to and during all negotiations in order to determine the most apt working relationship once a final agreement has been determined as any hurdles or obstacles cannot be easily overcome “on the field”.

It is evident that today’s customers are fickle, brand agnostic, and ruthless, especially with a mobile in hand and social media apps awaiting comments, tweets or posts. Businesses and 3PLs must work together to create a harmonious working environment for each other as well as for their collective customers.

/ By Karan Mudliar / Blog • Uncategorized/ • • • • • • • / 7 Comments

Explaining Micro-Reduction and Processing

Seeds are great food. They are great additives to salads and other food items. They are not only a great source of nutrition; they also add a great flavour and crunchy texture to the food they are added to. But seeds are difficult to process from supply chain point of view. They are live. They are the source of life of new plant and contain the essentials for growth and nutrition of seedlings. They are designed by nature to sustain harsh conditions and yet grow into a plant when conditions are right.  However, this very advantage of theirs is the reason that they are favourite of bacteria (such as salmonella) and fungus as well. Seeds can develop pathogens at any time during their transportation and storage. The long duration of storage before they are consumed, makes them susceptible to develop pathogens at any time during their journey from the plant to the table. Not only that, during their journey there is a risk that the seed may die, losing essential enzymes and proteins and thus changing its taste. Because of these reasons seed processing and packaging requires a special setup for their supply chain management. An experienced 3PL would have a separate processing for seeds and grains to ensure high yield and high viability of the seeds, when it reaches to the table of the end consumer.

 

Seeds are grown and transported across thousands of kilometres. They move from the places where nature intended them to reproduce to places where human intend to consume them. The transportation to the place of consumption and place of consumption itself are harsh for the seeds and full of pathogens that seeds are not designed to sustain. Not only that, seeds collect waste, stones and sometimes metal pieces while being processed by machines. The net effect is that the yield of useful, edible, high quality seed is very low. There are numerous incidents when the whole batch of seeds has been rejected due to health considerations. The sterilization process controls the pathogens in the seed and enables the batch to meet the health and safety standards by following the below mentioned steps.

 

Large screening: The heavy contamination particles (stones, metal, droppings) are easier to remove. Filtering the seed through right mesh size and passing through a metal screen usual does a great work of removing these. However, for finer contamination, such as bird droppings, feathers, light weed seeds etc. the process is little tricky. The blow air technique is used to filter these. The seeds are passed through of flow of air. The air pressure is just right so that everything except the seed is blown away and just the seeds drop in the collection bin or for very light seeds, just the seeds are blown and collected and everything else drops in the waste collection.

 

Sterilization: There are various processes that reduce the bacteria, mould and general infectious substances in the seed. For example, fumigation is passing antibacterial fumes through the seed. While it kills the bacteria, it leaves small amount of chemical on the seed. These can be cleaned with water, but that brings its own challenges.  Dry heat processing kills the germs very effectively. Process the seed through very high heat for little time. However, this process is known to alter the taste of the seed. The seeds tend to retain the heat and get cooked (even if by a very small amount). Some seeds even die and change the texture completely due to heat. Dry steam processing is another technique that claims to give good results, but suffers from drawback of exposing the seed to very high temperatures and it also leaves some residual water on the seed. Though all the techniques are excellent, none of them offer high yield assurance with little or no change to the flavour and texture of the seed. Pasteurization, fumigation, irradiation etc. have not really met the expectation that customers have from a sterilization process.

 

A newer technique of organic micro reduction which involves using oxygen to kill bacteria like salmonella has much higher yield. The seed is coated with a liquid solution. The solution harnesses the power of oxygen to neutralize the pathogens and provides total coverage. The liquid then biodegrades leaving the seed unaltered. The seed is completely safe, sterilized, organic, raw and viable, just as nature intended it to be. The validated intervention system ensures application to every individual seed. The complete commercial system such as NEO PURE also includes the option of a dryer, where the seeds are coated with solutions that dry off faster to ensure completely dry consistent seeds, leaving a completely dry and viable seed. The process is used by many suppliers for almost any kind of non-sprouted grain and non-sprouted seed.

 

Repackaging and screening: The processed seeds are then packed into small quantity packing as required for retail. The care must be taken that the packing material is itself sterilized and free of all micro bacterial culture, and does not allow any water or air to pass into the packing, to the seeds during shipping and storage. The retail packs are then passed through a final metal screening to ensure that there is no metal piece that has escaped into the final outgoing product. This screening is usually done using x-ray technique which is harmless to the seeds.

 

 

So, as we see that seeds and grains are gaining popularity as food toppings, right from breads to salads; it is imperative that vendors adapt to newer sterilization techniques for better business results. With newer techniques of sterilization, the vendor can ensure that his seeds are safe, healthy and nutritious, when they reach the consumer and we all know that Happy Customers mean Happy Business!

/ By Karan Mudliar / Blog • Uncategorized/ • • • • / 5 Comments

10 Myths About E-commerce Fulfilment Solutions

The high paced growth of the E-commerce sales channel has given immense boost to the E-commerce Fulfillment Solutions and various Third Party Logistics companies. However, there exists a wide section of the market – especially the smaller, newer e-commerce players who debate the concepts of outsourcing their Fulfillment operations or for that matter, even consider a professional Fulfillment solution. So here’s an attempt to break certain myths about the whole order Fulfillment solution and put things into perspective.

  1. Getting orders is tough; Order Fulfillment is easy.

Right and wrong. While the base of any business is getting more and more orders for your products, it is equally important to have a seamless, cost effective and fully optimized order Fulfillment process in place to ensure repeat customers, better revenues and even better profits. Many small and new businesses believe that having a good product to sell is a war won. However, what they miss is that order Fulfillment is a giant that will slowly grow so big that it would be tedious and not profitable to do it all by themselves.

  1. Fulfillment solutions are only for the BIGGIES.

A BIG Myth. Fulfillment solutions can benefit businesses of any scale. The key is to tap on the right Fulfillment partner for your business’s need. A bit of research and having clarity of what you need from your Fulfillment partner can be far more beneficial and economical than doing it all by yourself.

  1. Fulfillment Solutions Are Expensive.

At the first look of it – Yes they are! But have a closer detailed look and you would know that it’s an investment that saves you a lot more expense at a later point…maybe even today. If you are an ecommerce merchant handling your own order Fulfillment, you know how high your fixed costs have gone. You can cut them down by outsourcing your order Fulfillment to a specialized Fulfillment solution provider. Imagine not having to bear the cost of that warehouse?

  1. Order Fulfillment solutions are only friends of ‘volumes’.

No doubt, volumes ensure better profits but Fulfillment solutions are profitable to all. Smaller businesses often go through fluctuations in their sale volumes. Festivals and special occasions can sometimes give a huge spike which can become highly difficult to manage in terms of product deliveries. Having a Fulfillment partner ensures that you receive the scale up and down of order Fulfillment resources without having to either increase your fixed costs or lose market credibility with poor deliveries.

  1. We’re too small to have complex systems and processes

Small e commerce ventures believe that having Fulfillment solutions may end up complicating their otherwise simple delivery process. On the contrary, if you wish to grow and scale up your business in future, it is far more important to have your processes put right at an early stage. Looking in to detailing at the start and letting Fulfillment experts set up your base can actually save you lot of time, money and effort of revamping at a later stage.

  1. We know them best- Our Business, Our Customers

Most retailers are driven by the thought that they know their business and their customers well and no third party can match up to the standards of reaching out to their customer. Remember, just like you, the 3PL or Fulfillment solution providers are experts of their business and your delivery services may actually not match up to their efficiency and standards. Let the experts do the job!

  1. We’ll lose sight and control.

Business owners worry that having their warehouse stocking, logistics and shipping out of their main system may lead to losing sight of their product and control on their deliveries. However, the truth is that modern Fulfillment solutions give better control and visibility to business owners. With providers offering real time tracking, order Fulfillment can be a cake walk.

  1. It’s Only Packing and Shipping! What Extra would They Do?

Most small to mid-size companies are not fully aware of the offerings of modern day 3PL’s and thus fail to see the benefit. Order Fulfillment companies are way beyond a pick, pack, ship player. Their extensive value added services can really help your business grow.

  1. They may stunt our growth

For the ambitious ones, being stuck with a Fulfillment partner is a scary thought. The truth, however, is having selected a ‘fit to your needs’ Fulfillment partner and having a great working rapport can in reality help you scale faster than you could do yourself.  Your partner scales up as your business grows.

  1. What if my inventory is slow moving? It’ll be far more expensive.

Yes, it’s a fact that there may be chances of you paying much extra on storage for slow moving inventory. However, collaborating with a good Fulfillment partner who gives you a good picture of your stock and stats, can help you avoid the scenario of SMI in the first place. Additionally, Fulfillment solution providers offer value added services like promotions in order delivery which can help the slow inventory pick pace.