5 Tips to Prepare for the Holiday Rush
Over the past two years, retail spending has increased over 14 percent. It is partly due to consumers wanting to return to their pre-Covid lives, returning to stores to shop, and the influx of money from the government giving them extra money to spend. So, with the continual rise of Ecommerce and shopping trends alongside supply chain delays, will there be enough inventory for the holiday season? Here are some tips to help you prepare for the holiday season.
1. Increase Inventory
With shipping delays it is important to stock up now, to ensure you have the products available as the orders come in. Look at past reports to see what items sell well during the holiday season and be sure to stock up on those popular items.
2. Entice Customers to Shop Early
In order to combat the holiday shopping rush, businesses will want to start enticing shoppers to get their holiday shopping done now instead of waiting to the last minute. Setup email campaigns to go out to current customers and setup social media posts to run throughout the holiday season. Product specific discounts can be offered for the popular items you know you have available. Or offer weekly discounts to get customers to return multiple times to your store. If your inventory is running short, you can offer discounts on gift cards. It gets a new set of customers to your brick and mortar or online stores and hopefully they will be shopping at a time when you have higher inventory levels.
3. Hire Seasonal Workers Now
Hire temporary workers early now to ensure you have enough staff to fulfill the influx of orders. Especially, if you are offering discounts early, you should start seeing an increase of orders come in. Also, this will give time for new workers to get trained on the systems and processes.
4. Plan Picking Paths
Through your Warehouse Management System (WMS) you can group or wave orders by different criteria such as shipping times, destination, customer, and product characteristics to give pickers the most efficient path through the warehouse. This also allows you to prioritize those orders that require a quicker turnaround time to get them out the door faster. Are your most popular items located near the shipping stations and doors, or are they at the back of the warehouse? Make sure your inventory is stored in a manner conducive to a productive picking path. While this is basic, many warehouses are not organized properly for the seasonal nature of many products. Velocity changes!
5. Setup Packing Stations
Do you need to setup additional packing stations? Make sure you have enough stations to accommodate the flux of product shipment and that these stations are fully stocked with packaging supplies.
Is your warehouse prepared for the holiday rush? Contact the experts at Cadre Technologies to help automate your warehouse processes with warehouse management solutions.
