The concept of warehousing has evolved tremendously over the past few years. Especially after authorities imposed several lockdowns due to COVID-19, warehousing has gathered an altogether new meaning in the supply chain of various eCommerce businesses. Being an integral aspect of any brand’s operations, warehousing, supply chain management, and eCommerce fulfillment have grown to become more than just a space, warehouse racks, forklift, etc.
The digitization of warehouses has become necessary for businesses to make operations more efficient, improve customer experience, and improve their capabilities.
Intelligent warehouses are the future, and businesses are slowly adopting the concept of speed, automation, visibility, and transparency in their eCommerce supply chain.
Let’s look at what digital warehousing is and its scope in our supply chains.
What is Digital Warehousing?
Digital warehousing uses modern technology and optimization to improve warehouse processes and workflows.
Digital warehousing improves speed and accuracy, and transparency.
Today, several brands outsource their operations to tech-enabled fulfillment centers to flexibly scale their business.
How is Digital Warehousing Different from Traditional Warehousing?
Traditional warehousing is storing eCommerce inventory in a designated warehouse space until the items are fulfilled.
Usually, the inventory is put away in these warehouses where it is inefficiently managed, which often causes a delay in order processing, and there is a lack of information transfer between different warehouses and locations.
In digital warehousing, warehouses are optimized with the help of technology to automate operations, record data in real-time, and increase the speed and efficiency of fulfillment.
Under digital warehousing, businesses or 3PL fulfillment centers utilize warehouse and inventory management systems to share data with different stakeholders in real-time. This helps in integrating the supply chain and optimizing operations for your business.
Advantages of Digital Warehousing
Improve Efficiency
The first and foremost advantage of digital warehousing is the improvement of efficiency. When you optimize and automate operations in your warehouse, the dependency on manual labor decreases, and you can conduct operations in a much more streamlined manner with arrow centralization between different components of your supply chain. This helps you reduce the order to ship time, and you can improve your order accuracy tremendously.
Increase Visibility
When you share data in real-time with different stakeholders in the supply chain management process, it helps improve visibility across channels. Digital warehousing improves visibility by utilizing warehouse management and inventory management systems to track data and records in real-time.
Promote Integrated Systems
Several moving parts are added and subtracted when your supply chain grows with your eCommerce business. You need to have direct touchpoints with every component, from receiving inventory to picking, shipping, and even managing returns.
With digital warehousing, you can promote an integrated operation system where data is shared continuously throughout the supply chain. This type of complete transparency enables you to track inventory stored in multiple fulfillment centers, know when to reorder stock, and access inventory levels.
The Scope of Digital Warehousing
Digital warehousing is slowly becoming a known phenomenon among D2C eCommerce businesses growing in India. Let’s have a look at the scope of digital warehousing.
Real-Time Information Transfer
Digital warehousing will promote real-time information transfer throughout the supply chain, which will enable businesses to make decisions much faster and optimize their warehousing and fulfillment operations. This will allow access to inventory stored in multiple fulfillment centers so that companies can avoid situations of stockouts and dead inventory accumulation.
Warehouse Management Systems
Next, digital warehousing will incorporate the use of warehouse management systems that will help optimize the layout of the warehouse, formulate intelligent routes for picking executives to reduce the processing time, integrate the order management system on the website with the warehouse management system in the location to update inventory level in real-time, keep track of incoming orders, etc.
Forecast Demand
Digital warehousing will bring to life the concept of demand forecasting, where sellers can forecast the demand at different times of the year based on past trends, inventory levels, etc. this will help plan for the season better and maintain inventory levels according to the data rather than guesswork.
Automation in the Warehouse
Automation within the warehouse will enable faster processing times and improve delivery, logistics, and return management. This will enhance customer experience by a considerable margin as the executives working in the warehouse will be able to process orders quickly and without errors. An improved order accuracy will help improve your successful deliveries and reach customers faster.
Real-Time Inventory Management
Last but not least, digital warehousing will enhance real-time inventory management that will help you keep track of your inventory at different levels, avoid occurrences of discrepancies, and avoid situations of stockouts.
How Can 3PL Fulfillment Providers Help?
Even though digital warehousing might seem like a lucrative concept that you would want to apply to your eCommerce business, it is no secret that it involves a lot of capital investment. Automating your warehouse might seem the solution to many of your problems; however, sourcing systems can become difficult.
This is where 3PL fulfillment providers come into the picture. 3PL fulfillment providers like Shiprocket Fulfillment have multiple fulfillment centers located across the country equipped with the latest warehouse management and inventory management systems. They provide you with complete visibility across fulfillment centers and let you outsource order fulfillment entirely or partially.
With 3 PL fulfillment providers, you can achieve the success and benefits of digital warehousing without investing in its physical aspect. Without a doubt, 3PL fulfillment providers like Shiprocket Fulfillment help you reduce order processing time, delivery time, shipping costs, and RTO.
Final Thoughts
Digital warehousing is the next big thing for eCommerce in India. If you are not automating systems for yourself, you live under a rock. It is time to upgrade and bring your eCommerce business to par with the leading brands.
