The Evolving Retailers Fulfillment Strategy: Meeting Demands with Agility

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Tori (Online Retail Today)

Welcome everyone and happy Thursday. Thank you for joining us for the evolving retailers fulfillment strategy. Meaning demand with agility, presented by Online Retail Today and sponsored by Orium and Fluent Commerce. I’m Tori, the webinar coordinator of Online Retail Today, and I'm excited to bring you this new session on how to optimize fulfillment processes, tackle complex, multi-vendor orders, and create seamless customer experiences.

00:00:34:14 - 00:00:53:24

John Vurdelja (Fluent Commerce)

I'm really looking forward to hearing from Becky Parisotto and John Vurdelja, and what I'm sure will be an insightful discussion. In case you missed any part of this webinar. We will be recording this session and emailing it to you within the next 48 hours. You can also go to the registration page to access the recording. We're going to be sending that link over to you in the chat box right now.

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Unknown

Up next.

00:00:59:10 - 00:01:18:07

John Vurdelja (Fluent Commerce)

Before we go any further, I want to thank Orium and Fluent Commerce for sponsoring this webinar and helping us to make this happen. Orium is the leading composable commerce consultancy and systems integrator in the Americas. They work with best in class technology partners to set strong, composable commerce foundations that support, help bring and serve their customers across channels.

00:01:18:09 - 00:01:45:26

John Vurdelja (Fluent Commerce)

Fluent Commerce is a global software company focused on inventory availability, data management at scale and distributed order management for commerce. Both B2C and B2B organizations rely on their cloud-native, highly flexible and fully scalable solutions to transfer fulfillment complexities into competitive advantages. So things again, or even fluent commerce. Up next, let's get some technical things out of the way.

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Unknown

Don't hesitate to send in your questions throughout today's presentation for the Q&A session with our panelists. At the end of the hour. You can do so by submitting your questions into the toolbar. the Q&A panel found in the toolbar that's in the bottom of this webinar window. The chat is also open for open discussion, but please know we will be using the Q&A panel for your specific questions.

00:02:07:24 - 00:02:23:29

Unknown

My wonderful colleague Tara will be fielding your questions today, and you'll be happy to answer anything technical you might have. So feel free to pull up the chat, say hello and let her know where you're joining us from. Closed captioning is available to enable this. Features like the more button in the bottom toolbar and select the Show Captions option.

00:02:24:02 - 00:02:47:17

Unknown

Lastly, if you have any audio issues in today's presentation, you may choose to dial in by phone, and dial-in information can be found in your webinar confirmation email from Zoom, but Tara can relay it to you at any point if you need it. Up next. Again today I'm really excited to hear from our two panelist. So I'm going to pass it over to Becky and John.

00:02:47:19 - 00:03:12:24

Becky Parisotto (Orium)

Thank you Tori. Hello all, I'm Becky Parisotto, I'm the VP of digital programs at Orium and I help customers figure out how do we improve our digital ecosystem in a composable stack. I'm looking forward to chatting about order management today. It's a super hot topic in 2025. I'm having tons of customers circling around trying to figure out is it for us and how do we move forward with this thinking?

00:03:13:08 - 00:03:33:01

John Vurdelja (Fluent Commerce)

And I'm joined by John. John, do you want to intro yourself? Yeah. Thanks, Becky. John Vurdelja, head of partner success here at fluent. So, yeah, I get to work, with our partners, like Becky and the awesome team. Really, from upfront sales and go to market all the way through implementation of our order management capability.

00:03:33:12 - 00:03:54:02

Unknown

So I really get to see a lot of how, our businesses are capitalizing on, that investment and serving their customers. So excited to be here and talk about, fulfillment today with that. Just a quick look at the agenda here. We'll go through all of this. But, you know, as you can see, a lot of topics to go through.

00:03:54:26 - 00:04:25:25

Unknown

You know, Becky and I will kind of be going through our experiences and what we're seeing in the market. And we'll have some time to hear from you as well. So first up, why fulfillment matters in 2025? I think, you know, customers have really come to expect a level of service, that requires high level of communication, execution, flexibility, and when you erode that trust in the consumer experience, it can often lead to business impacts.

00:04:26:09 - 00:04:55:24

Unknown

As you can see here. And, and, you know, that might even turn those customers into former customers. And if we rewind five years at this point, which is kind of crazy to, COVID. That was an interesting, I would say, catalyst to what we saw with bopis and curbside pickup. And this expectation from customers to be able to, you know, buy from, from their, favorite businesses and still receive their product.

00:04:55:24 - 00:05:17:03

Unknown

And so we saw a lot of businesses had to adapt quickly to that customer expectation. And a lot's happened over those last five years. Certainly. And we've seen a 40% year over year growth for BOPIS orders. But it doesn't end there. What we've seen a lot lately as well is that there's a broader mix of ordering channels, too.

00:05:17:15 - 00:05:51:18

Unknown

So thinking about marketplaces, social ecom store, etc.. So having many different ordering channels, a variety of different fulfillment, options for the customer. There's a lot of expectations there. Customer just wants to buy where, where it's can be to them and get the product where it's convenient to them. So a lot to, you know, kind of figure out as a business so that you can provide that seamless experience for your customers and, and retain them over time, by delivering on those promises.

00:05:51:21 - 00:06:26:11

Unknown

So we want to we want to explore the question, what are the biggest fulfillment challenges that your business might be facing today? So I'll walk through a couple of concepts here. And if you're identifying as, experiencing any of these problems and maybe order management is where you need to start playing to fix them up. So we're going to put up a poll here as well and have you help us understand what's the business up against what we're seeing commonly right now is we're seeing organizations that are struggling with very common blockers, like how do I ship larger items?

00:06:26:11 - 00:06:50:17

Unknown

We have customers that are working with appliances. They're working with furniture. Logistically, that takes something different, through the order management system and through the business operations experience to fulfill. We're also seeing a lot of coordinating bundle based delivery. So example being you've bought tile, you've brought back grout, you've got tools for bathroom remodel, and you have multiple SKUs in that order.

00:06:50:19 - 00:07:13:04

Unknown

How does how does the OMS consolidate that and help you to fulfill that order. Without so much swivel chair. So how do we automate some of that problem? The omnichannel expectation, like John said, is huge right now. So we did leapfrog ahead about ten years in what's expected from a customer from, shipping to the home bopis same day delivery.

00:07:13:04 - 00:07:35:27

Unknown

The customer's expectation grew in the last few years. And so we need technology that can keep pace with that mindset. Lastly, probably what my customers experienced the most seasonal spikes. So we start getting ready with customers for Black Friday in the springtime and making sure that your systems can handle the stress of those seasonal spikes is mission critical.

00:07:36:09 - 00:07:50:08

Unknown

My dad used to tell me when I was a teenager, you know, your car acts up in the summer and it dies in the winter. So what are you doing in the summer? To make sure that it is ready for the winter season. When it's real cold out? I'm Canadian. And that's the exact same thing with your order management.

00:07:50:08 - 00:08:12:21

Unknown

If you're seeing signs of stress in your system in a moderate to low season, what is going to happen to it when it's under load in a high season? So we would love to have you, answer a poll here and participate with us a bit. So what is the team's biggest fulfillment challenge in 2025?

00:08:12:23 - 00:08:51:12

Unknown

All right. What are we getting here for? Some results. So we're seeing that enhancing customer satisfaction is coming out as the number one. Yes. Customers expectations are significantly higher. Now John, what are you feeling in the way of customer expectations. And experience. Are you seeing anything specific. Yeah. And we'll have a lot to get through on this topic specifically because I think, you know, the customer has sort of been trained by, by Amazon in a lot of these different, you know, fulfillment problems that we're going to talk through here and, and timing that we're going to talk through.

00:08:51:12 - 00:09:11:19

Unknown

So it's really up to, these businesses to, you know, keep moving forward and keep, delivering on that promise where, you know, if customers are, you know, we'll cover covered in the trend on the next slide. But the, the trend of needing immediate fulfillment same day. How are you going to do that? How how can you know?

00:09:11:20 - 00:09:36:03

Unknown

There's technology and there's the, the your processes around doing and executing that. And it is easier said than done. And so, you know, what we're definitely seeing a lot of that, right now, certainly. Do we want to jump into, the future fulfillment and touch on those topics? Yeah, yeah. And thanks, everyone for participating in that, because it's good to kind of get context.

00:09:36:03 - 00:09:55:05

Unknown

And it was good to also see a lot of, you know, it wasn't all weighted to one, you know, obviously the customer satisfaction. Customer satisfaction was the leader on that poll. But I mean, there are a variety of challenges that we're seeing businesses face. And, you know, looking at the future of fulfillment, some of the trends that we're seeing.

00:09:55:05 - 00:10:18:18

Unknown

So I, you know, I, I just mentioned that on demand, same day delivery growth, the bopis curbside, obviously you as the customer could, you know, you drive and get the product that same day. But being able to deliver to you at your doorstep, at your office or wherever you are, is becoming more and more prevalent.

00:10:18:21 - 00:10:41:18

John Vurdelja (Fluent Commerce)

And in order to do that, we're seeing a lot of businesses with that last mile provider innovation and enablement and finding ways, to be able to get that product to the customer as quickly as possible. Becky had a good example with, with the ordering, with all the different sort of, supplies of the grout and tile and things like that.

00:10:41:18 - 00:11:08:02

Unknown

If you think about in a DIY, segment, being able to get product that same day is super important, not only for you as a consumer doing something, at your house, but even extending that to, you know, maybe even smaller businesses that need product for a job, you know, whether it's getting it delivered to somewhere or being able to pick it up that same day, that, is critical for timing.

00:11:08:09 - 00:11:37:06

Unknown

And we're seeing that more and more, value of the store, at NFE this year. This was a big topic. A lot of the store, trends, there are a lot just in the experience. And I'm sure you've all felt that if you've gone into, different stores, with, you know, maybe there's more food and beverage, maybe there's more technology, that's to, you know, obviously continue to engage with the customer.

00:11:37:06 - 00:12:06:19

Unknown

Specific to the fulfillment side, though, the value of the store is pivotal. They're there's not they're not just going to be for shopping. They're critical fulfillment nodes in, you know, the new logistics model here. And, you know, what it does is it allows you to build that supply chain resilience and have more flexibility there. It can absolutely improve the speed in which you can get the product to the customer and how efficient you can do that.

00:12:06:21 - 00:12:31:25

John Vurdelja (Fluent Commerce)

And it's often very convenient for the customer. With with that in mind. Now, an example here we have a, a customer who's a global shoe retailer, and they are solely shipping from their stores. No pun intended. They have hundreds of stores across North America, and they're solely shipping from those stores now. There's a lot that goes into that.

00:12:32:02 - 00:13:01:21

Unknown

But it allows flexibility. And, you know, some of these metrics that we talk about, whether it's reducing cost or the speed to get it to the customer or, being able to adjust your inventory picture in different locations. There's a lot of value in being able to use your store in that, in that model. Alternatively, though, you know, that's that's for, you know, a shoe retailer, if you think about a furniture, store front, it's going to be a little bit different.

00:13:01:24 - 00:13:31:12

Unknown

There's gonna be a lot of product that's not going to be, you know, purchased and carried out the front door. So figuring out how to then use that store as, you know, the showroom and then allow a more of the extended aisle type of, purchasing from the store that can then be shipped to your house or delivered if there's, you know, bulk items, but also, marrying that up with, the different product that's available, directly in the store as well, and being able to fulfill from that location.

00:13:31:12 - 00:14:02:08

Unknown

So a lot, lot to consider when it comes to the store. And, there's been a big, big trend in returns lately, 17% of revenue for retailers in 2025 will be returned. So we're almost a fifth of the revenue is going to be returned. And what does that do? If you can return into the store and get customers back in the store, you know, fulfillment isn't just going to be, getting product to the customer.

00:14:02:08 - 00:14:27:19

Unknown

It's also the reverse logistics here. And being able to get customers back in the store and purchasing more product is going to be super important as well. So really viewing how you can capitalize on that store, experience and process throughout the entire fulfillment, is key here. And, finally, AI powered capabilities, we thought about, you know, leaving I off the webinar, but we figured we have to mention it.

00:14:28:16 - 00:14:51:05

Unknown

I think the big thing here over the last 12 to 18 months, we've seen experiments trying out AI, figuring out, and maybe thinking about where it goes. We're going to see a lot more application of AI in 2025. Could be in order sourcing and, routing orders could be in inventory planning, you know, demand planning.

00:14:51:05 - 00:15:17:19

Unknown

Where should you be putting your inventory to support those vast ordering channels, etc.? But the biggest thing is data is going to drive that and you have to have the right data. Clean data. Data is going to fuel all of this to operate. So I think, you know, we would encourage businesses to look at AI within their, their business.

00:15:18:03 - 00:15:41:17

Unknown

But first, analyzing the data and ensuring, that will support what you are looking to do. There. Now, I know we covered this, just briefly earlier in the poll, about some of the challenges that you all are facing. So, Becky's going to go through this in a little bit more detail. Coming off of that, I like your point about data.

00:15:42:16 - 00:16:07:09

Unknown

Most of the pains that we experience in operations and in limitations around technology are rooted in the fact that the data is not connected, cleaned, available, real-time, etc., etc. so there is nothing sexy about the investment in time and energy that needs to go into getting your data right. But it will be the number one blocker for how much you can or cannot use the new AI features.

00:16:07:09 - 00:16:26:11

Unknown

Going forward. So if your competitors already have nice, clean data, they can hop on and start operationalizing the AI. And you are going to be stuck in a two year long data project. I'm seeing quite a bit of that. Last year everybody was saying I and I was like, okay, okay, okay. This year I'm like, oh yeah, it's here.

00:16:26:11 - 00:16:50:25

Unknown

It's real. This is happening. Let's get this data in order. So, okay, but that little aside, the challenges that retailers and brands are seeing today. So, we have a couple of examples up here. But what something that we're seeing is that supply chain volatility is, is, spiking up again. So we're seeing disruption from global events, labor shortages, material constraints, all of the tariff talk going on in North America.

00:16:51:09 - 00:17:23:19

Unknown

This is this is showing us a weak point around that supply chain volatility. And this is something that we really need to be thoughtful about in order to be able to execute for our customers. And that multi-vendor coordination complexity, this is something that, OMS should solve for. I see customers trying to solve for this. Basically in a combination of their ERP and their WMS to avoid consolidating it and properly handling it in an OMS, because it's a lot of work to get it there and get it clean.

00:17:23:25 - 00:17:45:01

Unknown

But once you do, your world is opened up. So really, how are you managing those orders that are split across warehouses? Combine that with drop shippers. Combine that with three plus. Once you stack on all of these variables, you need to have an OMS that can scale to meet those needs. So this is something where I think people try to solve it in other large management systems.

00:17:45:01 - 00:18:09:27

Unknown

And they can do it, but it is painful. It is very manual, it is very expensive. And the OMS can really help get you through that. And then yes. So we're coordinating for those split shipments. And then the stock outs are really hurting the revenue as well. I want to point out this one, so when you have that real-time inventory visibility, retailers and brands are likely to, without that, pardon me.

00:18:09:27 - 00:18:27:23

Unknown

Without that visibility, retailers and brands are likely to oversell and overselling can be very dangerous. This is leading to those canceled orders. This is leading to that loss of trust. If you are integrated into Amazon and selling there as well, this can have massive long term consequences for how you will be penalized if your stock is inaccurate.

00:18:28:05 - 00:18:50:13

Unknown

In those third party, marketplace systems. So we want to make sure that we're very mindful of those stock outs and what it can do to your brand reputation as, as well as your revenue and your future potential. In marketplace. So these are just a few examples of, of where we're really seeing that. If you have other areas where you're like, this is my biggest challenge today, feel free to pop it in the chat.

00:18:50:13 - 00:19:15:22

Unknown

And we're we're happy to talk through it, best we can. So I guess ultimately what I think we should take away from this slide is we have common pain points. What you're experiencing is likely not novel. And this is where your order management should solve for. So if you're feeling these blockers or revenue is getting stopped, or the customer experience is getting stopped in any of these channels, this is when you look to your OMS.

00:19:15:22 - 00:19:44:12

John Vurdelja (Fluent Commerce)

This is, these are very classic symptoms of, of an OMS need or blocker. And, and I think to add to that too, I think the stock outs, you know, we, I think it's a process that if somebody, from fluent, you know, or purchases from a company shows as in stock, and then three hours later, they get the cancellation email, it immediately goes into our prospect list because there's obviously something failing there somewhere.

00:19:44:12 - 00:20:07:15

Unknown

Right? It could be just getting the right inventory data into the system for, you know, presentation on the website. It could be just lack of visibility like you mentioned. I mean, whether it's if it's a three PL or drop shipper, is there some sort of constraint that's not allowing it to be, accurate for that customer? And so whatever it is, it's going to frustrate you as the consumer.

00:20:07:21 - 00:20:29:10

Unknown

And, and, you know, with what we talked about at the beginning, either lack of repeat business or just walking away entirely and, and some of them are relatively simple things to address throughout this process. And so, you know, it can be more complex with stock outs as a result of putting inventory in the wrong spots and stuff like that.

00:20:29:10 - 00:20:58:19

Unknown

But, you know, as we go, I think there's, there's opportunity to kind of pick off a lot of these one at a time, rather than feeling overwhelmed by everything that's involved. Certainly I do want to hop forward here, and you can chat in a bit more depth around managing that complexity at scale. Yeah. And I think the if we look at this, there's we've kind of mentioned a few different types of, you know, fulfillment processes based on product types.

00:20:58:19 - 00:21:19:25

Unknown

And I think managing a fulfillment network that serves different product types know and whether it be, you know, high turnover items or these oversize goods or custom made products, you really need some dynamic workflows that can adjust based on where the inventory is your storage needs at the different facilities, and then how that product is going to get delivered.

00:21:20:18 - 00:21:49:23

Unknown

You know, bulky and heavy items like furniture or appliances, things like that obviously require specialized handling or white glove delivery. And, and, there's, there's an expectation, you know, as, as a customer. Right. Like that example that Becky provided earlier, let's say I'm getting, you know, these tiles and the grout and some other things. Well, the tiles might be arriving on a pallet and being dropped off, on a forklift versus the grout.

00:21:49:23 - 00:22:14:27

Unknown

That's just, you know, maybe it could be shipped small parcel, but being able to understand what the customer's ordering and does, all of it need to go together. Can it be split and we route the relevant bulky and heavy items down one path and then allow the other ones, to ship when ready. Sometimes you automate that, sometimes you put it in the customer's hands to decide that upfront in the checkout process.

00:22:15:08 - 00:22:43:15

Unknown

But it's all underpinned by, you know, those dynamic workflows to be able to do that. And I think similarly, you know, custom and made to order products, you really have to look all right up, really down the supply chain or up the supply chain to understand, like what is the lead time going to be for this? How can I synchronize this across kind of the manufacturing timelines for that product?

00:22:44:07 - 00:23:02:19

Unknown

Coordinating between, you know, potentially multiple vendors and the delivery process of that item. The customer doesn't really care how all that works. They just want to clear, like, yeah, this is the custom product that I want, and here's what I'm going to get it. And I'm going to be kept up to date because it's probably going to take some time.

00:23:02:21 - 00:23:33:26

Unknown

You know, that's you know, that's super important. And being able to drive that from start to finish and communicate to your customer, is pivotal, right. The having a flexible order management system that can kind of take those products, classify them, and then, you know, kind of what I was mentioning, if you're splitting it and routing through different paths, you can reduce some of the operational costs and the manual intervention.

00:23:33:26 - 00:24:00:07

Unknown

And, maybe even calls from the customer saying, where's my order? All of those things, are made much easier, when delivering this through, that flexible order management system. And, you know, it delivers on that customer experience. Now, speaking of customer experience, I think Becky can kind of highlight some things around, around that as well.

00:24:00:09 - 00:24:23:08

Unknown

Certainly. So the customer experience is sometimes, in my opinion, sort of in a secondary fashion to order management. Order management can often be viewed as a tool for the business to make it easier on the business user. But if we kind of flip that thinking, it is, what does the customer need to have an exceptional experience, and how can the order management system support that?

00:24:24:15 - 00:24:46:22

Unknown

It it's it sounds small, but it's a, it's a mind shift that is an important nuance in where you should invest in your OMS. So if you don't mind skipping to the next slide, actually, I want to chat a little bit about. So a couple of examples of delivering on those customer expectations that we see. Every customer has a different expectation for fulfillment.

00:24:46:27 - 00:25:06:19

Unknown

Every brand and retailer has a different expectation of how they provide that to you. But ultimately, like John said earlier, our expectation is set by giants like Amazon. Like that. That's it. Full stop. We all order from our phone. One click. We don't get our credit card out. We wait for it, we get a notification and it's magically here that day or the next day.

00:25:06:21 - 00:25:30:26

Unknown

That's really the pace that most businesses are trying to now match because of that, saturated experience that we see every day as a customer. So for businesses that are more complicated than that, though, where are areas that we should focus to meet those customers expectations? So really, that kind of white glove delivery for the premium service level, and the oversize item is a use case that we see a lot.

00:25:31:00 - 00:25:51:06

Unknown

So what does that high touch service feel like? How do we include that in home setup? How do we have assembly? How do we have package removal? How do we take away your old furniture, your old appliance? This is really important for the end to end experience that you give your customer. And this should be facilitated through your order management.

00:25:51:08 - 00:26:14:11

Unknown

You don't need to run ten systems to know that you're going to deliver a new washer and dryer. Take away an old washer and dryer that you're going to wear booties when you get to the house that your customer is going to get a text notification to let you know that you're 15 minutes away. This this experience should feel really seamless and you should start to think about it from how can I drive this through my order management system?

00:26:14:21 - 00:26:47:23

Unknown

I feel as a consumer, this is an area where businesses have a lot of area to improve. And, it when I, when I'm using websites making purchases, I'm thinking to myself, this is an OMS problem, but the business isn't thinking that same way as me because of the knowledge I have from this role. So, if you are in this category of oversize or need that white glove, I think that this raises the customer sentiment and the customer review and the customer return rate in a way that, people undervalue and you shouldn't.

00:26:47:23 - 00:27:08:16

Unknown

This is the difference maker here for me. Those kind of quick ship and everyday high demand products. This is another area where we see people really gaining a competitive edge that is facilitated through the OMS. So same day, next day, two day delivery, we want to meet that customer's expectation for instant gratification. We all have that in us as consumers.

00:27:08:23 - 00:27:26:25

Unknown

And so we want to be very mindful that this should be our target. So what products are we selling that fit into these same day, next day or two day categories. And then let's track that KPI and actually hit it. So this is great for consumer packaged goods. This is great for apparel, electronics and those essentials. We want to be competitive.

00:27:26:26 - 00:27:46:29

Unknown

We do not on our customer ever to think where is my package of vitamins that should be there the next day without any thought on their behalf? Our OMS should help take care of that. So how do we how do we talk about this internally? How do we optimize for this? How do we look at warehouse proximity? How do we look at the partnerships we have with our carriers.

00:27:47:06 - 00:28:07:23

Unknown

And this is really that category where automation should be your best friend. This shouldn't be so complex that automation can't help you. You should reduce the human contact here. And you should have this. Set it and forget it best you can. So back to a very clean and efficient data model to fulfill this. Quick ship need for the consumer.

00:28:07:25 - 00:28:32:25

Unknown

And lastly, we want to help to understand balancing the cost versus the experience in the fulfillment model. So white glove sounds great to businesses. But as a business owner and operator, you're thinking, how much is this going to cost me though? So this is where your OMS needs to help facilitate. So you have to have an understanding of your fulfillment speed, your product type, your margin and your customer expectation.

00:28:33:01 - 00:29:05:29

Unknown

You to balance this against the logistics. My personal opinion is this is an area where order orchestration and reorder orchestration should be thought through very carefully. If you're shipping something like furniture and you're shipping it from a warehouse in California, and you're shipping that to a customer in Colorado, and then there is a cancellation in the Colorado warehouse and suddenly that surface closer, your OMS should be smart enough to re orchestrate that order and change the fulfillment location, because it's going to save you a lot of money on a big truck.

00:29:06:01 - 00:29:27:05

Unknown

And it should do that at a proper cadence before the orders are sent out. And it should not require manual intervention. So this is the thinking of a modern OMS, a flexible OMS, one that can match your business and operational needs to help deliver those customer expectations so that your customer isn't calling customer service. They're not in the chat bot.

00:29:27:05 - 00:29:46:20

John Vurdelja (Fluent Commerce)

They're getting those real-time updates, and they know what's going to happen next without asking for it is essentially the goal. John, I don't know if you have anything else to add there or if you want. Yeah. On on the cost thing. I mean, you kind of back to the store fulfillment model there we see 27% lower fulfillment costs if you're shipping from stores.

00:29:47:09 - 00:30:10:07

Unknown

As, as the focal point for that. So often it can be a, you know, a win rate saving money while also providing that, you know, expected experience from the customer in terms of speed. You know, and so in order to do that, there's a lot, you know, you have to have accurate inventory from the stores to be able to serve up and be able to make those decisions on where to get the product from for the customer.

00:30:11:01 - 00:30:47:16

Unknown

They're interrelated. But there's definitely opportunity to, you know, not sacrifice one for the other either. So, yeah, it's, a lot to, you know, basically package up and make sure that, your, you know, getting your customers feedback as well to help make some of these decisions. And if we end, you know, going to, you know, a real world example, of, of a retailer that's executing on these improve customer experiences, freedom is one of Australia's most iconic furniture and homeware retailers.

00:30:47:16 - 00:31:23:12

John Vurdelja (Fluent Commerce)

For the last 40 years. They started as a single store and now they're a very established brand across, Australia, New Zealand and the goal for them was to lay the foundation for a future proof architecture using fluent order management so that they can provide that inventory visibility and, omnichannel fulfillment process so they could support home delivery from all stores, enhancing the pick/pack/dispatch efficiency, which reduced their cancellation rates, and the ability to support both home delivery and pickup on a single order.

00:31:23:19 - 00:31:46:05

Unknown

So we talked about earlier that, you know, kind of a, a basket that has a variety of product types. It might be convenient for the customer to have part of that be shipped to them, and then they just go grab whatever, is readily available in that store that same day, depending on the context. So having that flexibility not only for the business but also for the customer, is a great, advantage.

00:31:46:07 - 00:32:06:28

Unknown

And then their sourcing logic to fit their unique needs, like limiting the distance the order is sent based on the value of that order or limiting the distance the order is sent based on how fragile the item is. And and you can adapt that over time. You can understand what's working, understand, you know, and that's where the data and the analysis comes into play.

00:32:07:03 - 00:32:39:29

Unknown

And being able to flex and not be sort of locked into one approach, adjust, adjust to what your business is doing, adjust to what the customer is doing. Now, if we move forward to the results here, I mean, I think they speak for themselves. You can kind of read through this here. But the reality is it is all supported by this underlying, that can deliver that accurate inventory and facilitate that complex order orchestration.

00:32:40:01 - 00:33:05:17

Unknown

So if we move forward here to our next poll, we'll, we'll put it back to, to the audience here. I really want to understand what's the biggest barrier to scaling your fulfillment operations. So you have a couple of options, listed here, you know, see what's most relevant to you. We're definitely curious and kind of hearing, where the trend is, from you all out there.

00:33:05:19 - 00:33:24:25

Unknown

Furniture is always such an interesting example when we're looking at order management, because the body of a sofa might be in a different warehouse and need to have that white glove service versus the legs of the sofa can be shipped to your house, along with the pillows that you also ordered. So I love the furniture example because it is one of the most complex use cases that we can see.

00:33:24:27 - 00:33:52:02

Unknown

And when done right, and OMS handles it very well and can be a major, cost savings for the business. Yeah, absolutely. I agree. Okay. How are our poll results coming along? How are we ready to take a look at them. Let's see. All right. Complexity of integrating new systems I yeah it's about that as an answer.

00:33:52:02 - 00:34:21:20

Unknown

Is that complexity because of the people in the business or is it complexity of the technology or both. There's such a human element to accomplishing in. Yeah, both. Yeah. There's such a human element to accomplishing a successful, order management integration or any tech that is added or removed or adjusted in your stack. It really takes a thoughtful planning phase and understanding what you're getting into, from a tech perspective.

00:34:21:20 - 00:34:51:15

Unknown

But that change management, if it's not spoken of, how it's going to affect the business from the onset, it likely won't be successful or well, adopted. So curious. Yeah. And I see, you know, a comment in the chat about staffing is like an additional option here. Totally agree. I mean, when you think about scaling fulfillment, operations, technology and the access to the data and everything, here is one thing staffing and all those the example I provided around store fulfillment.

00:34:51:18 - 00:35:23:11

Unknown

Now, the ability to do that in the value that you would get as a business and the customer would get is, is evident. Having store employees be the front of the front of the house, helping customers real-time, but also doing a pick back ship process for online orders can be a can be a shift, right? It can be, you know, whether it's staffing, count and being able to support that from, the workload day to day or skill sets, etc..

00:35:23:16 - 00:35:53:10

Unknown

You know, there's, there's certainly, challenges that we can see there in terms of being able to scale up those types of operations. So it's a that's a great point. In terms of staffing being sort of an overlay to this entire thing. Staffing is also a barrier on, adopting the new technology to just completing a project that helps you level up or replace or introduce and or OMS simply staffing for the amount of work that comes into the tech team in the IT teams life.

00:35:53:10 - 00:36:30:26

Unknown

Because of those changes can be a big barrier for customers as well. And and it's a perfect segue, into, you know, scaling for seasonal peaks. So I think fulfillment, you know, scaling with the with the poll that we just asked, I think it's very much amplified in peaks. And, and Becky alluded to it earlier with, with the car example and just being able to understand where your bottlenecks, where, where is this going to struggle during surges in, in orders or, or traffic or you name it.

00:36:30:29 - 00:36:58:10

Unknown

And I think you have to be able to look at it both on the tech and the personnel and people and process side of things. Certainly there's on the technology side, you know, application and infrastructure. So you have to be confident in the systems that you have, from a performance testing and the scale and being able to support, you know, we have, for example, we have customers that do, flash sales, right?

00:36:58:10 - 00:37:25:26

Unknown

So that's, you know, that's that's a very finite window and you have a significant amount of volume increase during that time. So being able to have systems that support that and the inventory is accurate when you're dealing with a lot of order in a short period of time is critical. And then there's, there's, you know, obviously the traditional retailer Black Friday, Cyber Monday type, seasonality.

00:37:25:26 - 00:37:57:04

Unknown

But, you know, we have we have other customers that, you know, have different sort of seasonal, you know, promotions and different, buying waves essentially that affect, the, the scale of, you know, if the site and the order management, everything could be technically sound and support the performance. But if it's going through a warehouse and there's, a choke point there for getting orders out the door, you know, that's, that's a challenge.

00:37:57:04 - 00:38:20:12

Unknown

And that's where it comes with, you know, where is that? Is this in, seasonal staffing? Are there other things from a personnel standpoint to, you know, it there could be automation done where there's less manual intervention that can help alleviate some of these things. And, you know, you don't you don't have to be a massive company to be able to execute on these things.

00:38:20:14 - 00:38:44:21

Unknown

You know, thinking about, you know, the, the what you say, the fulfillment time. I, I ordered I order a sweater a few weeks back from it was actually from Scotland. Got shipped to me in Chicago here, I ordered it. It was at my doorstep within two days. I've ordered from other, let's say, retailers here in North America that are.

00:38:44:24 - 00:39:03:19

Unknown

And that was from more of like, a mom and pop type shop. I've ordered from large retailers here where, you know, I place the order and it just sits there and it doesn't even get shipped. I don't even get the shipping notification till four days later. Three days later. So these are these are simple things to be able to execute on.

00:39:04:18 - 00:39:35:11

Unknown

You know, and that's during sort of quiet time. Right. So as demand comes up, how do you ensure that you can continue to do that to deliver on your customers expectations? So there is definitely a staffing element to this, that, you know, I like Becky said, I mean, they, they work with, a variety of different, clients, not only on technology related, but also, you know, business operations and strategy type things as well.

00:39:35:13 - 00:40:05:06

Unknown

John, we have a question coming in here. Let me see. It's, it's, do you do you use any time series algorithms to forecast the extent of seasonal peaks? Let's see here. Yeah. So I think, you know, there's the I would say from, how businesses look at that and we look at, you know, demand planning and how to forecasting different, order volumes in the inventory and where it goes.

00:40:05:10 - 00:40:26:22

Unknown

We see that across a lot of our customers. And, and there's different tools and approaches that each of them might use different components to it. But, yeah, I mean, I think the, the I'll give I guess I'll give another example here that might be relevant, maybe less to seasonal peaks, but more of, I would say surges in orders.

00:40:26:22 - 00:41:03:16

Unknown

So one of our customers, the same two retailer, they realized that, you know, there was a concert that people were buying specific types of shoes to go to, to that concert. And you could see this surge in demand at each of those locations as the concert was moving through, the U.S. and Canada and being able to get ahead of some of those things and, forecast where are we going to see these spikes in demand for these particular products?

00:41:03:16 - 00:41:39:26

Unknown

So this is this is less about, you know, just fulfillment processes, but the inventory to support what the customers, you know, need in that given location. So what it allowed them to do is, you know, free up more inventory in those locations as that concert sort of progressed on its tour. And and if somebody from outside of that area was, you know, purchasing, or if somebody was purchasing product to be delivered to their house or something like that, they could make the decision to ship it from another, you know, non, surging location.

00:41:40:05 - 00:41:58:00

Unknown

So interesting. So I mean, you know, the time series algorithm forecasters, there's a lot of different tools and paths for that. And we see our customers utilizing those based on the, you know, the data that they have drawn with Taylor Swift. I can't think of anybody else that would influence shoe buying on that scale. I'll be honest.

00:41:58:04 - 00:42:17:23

Unknown

It was it was either it was either Taylor Swift or Beyonce, I feel I okay, I just think like literally a silver gemstone, glittery boots. Yeah. That has to be the product okay. Yes. And you see it right. Like and that's it's a unique sort of niche example. But accuracy, the data visibility to what's happening and being able to like understand that.

00:42:18:00 - 00:42:35:07

Unknown

Yes. Allows you to because you might there might be needs for even we're just talking about seasonality. Right. And just depending on your product that you're selling in certain regions of the country, there might be more of a demand for in-store buying that maybe you don't want to ship out of that store because you have a lot of foot traffic for that product.

00:42:35:09 - 00:43:00:16

Unknown

So you can you can offset that and say, hey, I'd rather sell more of this product and store and ship it from maybe another 200 miles, away, you know? So, we see that a lot with a customer that we have that sells, winter jackets and coats. It's very dependent on where is the snow in North America at that time and will determine, where their stocking inventory should be located, how to concentrate it.

00:43:00:18 - 00:43:35:21

Unknown

And if you ignore those trends or you don't observe the historical data and use that to apply it forward to your thinking for demand forecasting, you're missing out on a huge revenue opportunity. So, it's it is very relevant across seasonality, Taylor Swift effect on our economy, all these sorts of things. So exactly. Yeah. And I think we've we really mentioned a lot of this already, in terms of what that scalable system can do to support these, key capabilities for, for you and your customers.

00:43:36:01 - 00:44:03:20

Unknown

But I think when we talk about fulfillment, there might be more of a knee jerk reaction to think about fulfillment, as, you know, post purchase. But it's really, really important to make sure, you know, the before the buy button experience for that customers kind of looks into that fulfillment process. You know, the lead times that we're talking about and being able to look up the supply chain and understand where product is going to come from and how they can get it, you know, and be accurate about that.

00:44:03:23 - 00:44:21:02

Unknown

You know, your customers are really expecting you to be more of a fortune teller. And, you know, hey, yep. If you buy today, you'll be able to get it by, 2 p.m. tomorrow. So you have to execute on that. But you have to be able to understand where and how the product is going to get to that customer to be able to make that promise to them.

00:44:21:10 - 00:44:50:00

Unknown

So there's a lot of foundational elements here that, that allow you to be able to do those types of things comes back to that, to the boring but important topic of how do you use your data, how available is it? What areas of the business have access to it? How connected or disconnected is it, allowing you to really operationalize your business and, and react and, be proactive, but also, react to events and, and such?

00:44:50:03 - 00:45:14:14

Unknown

Yeah, I agree. And we think about these complex orders, you know, starting with, well, what is complex order. Well, I mean, a simple order might be more one product, small parcel from the only DC in the network, like straightforward. But when you add all these things that we've talked about with layering, the multiple vendors and different lead times, how you consolidate, do you need to transfer from store to store or from a DC to a store?

00:45:15:15 - 00:45:44:03

Unknown

You know, that's that's complex, right? And there might be some industry specific complexity, like with what we talked about with, construction or, you know, furniture related items, things like that. And, you know, having, an OMS that well-oiled, you know, and, and a well-oiled process that can reduce this complexity and make it turn into an advantage where you sort of abstract that from the customer and make it easier.

00:45:44:17 - 00:46:14:00

Unknown

That's that's really the end goal. And I think if we, if we kind of move into like reducing that friction for the customer, it, it does require a lot of precision and coordination and agility to be able to keep all of these things aligned. And the things being inventory your suppliers and the logistics around that, so that you can streamline this process.

00:46:14:00 - 00:46:42:24

Unknown

Now, if we look at, you know, the technology, managing all this, that, all that synchronization, you know, and being able to tie in to automation of, say, a vendor or a carrier selection and, and removing manual processes or, you know, manual review of an order, and be able to allow, some logic and some, automated process to, to drive everything for that.

00:46:44:13 - 00:47:20:29

Unknown

That fulfillment is, is crucial. And, you know, being able to then we've talked a lot about accurate inventory and the timelines, the, the estimated delivery date or estimated pickup time for the customer. It's, you know, it's table stakes to have the accurate inventory and then being able to then expand upon that. The example I provided with, you know, the, the concert tour and more predictive inventory allocation so that you can pre-position inventory across all of your locations to, to support what the customers are expecting.

00:47:21:01 - 00:48:11:22

Unknown

It allows you to then operate more efficiently, be cost effective, but also deliver for your customers, reduce those stock outs and things like that. And the having a multi source fulfillment and the consolidation that might be needed if you think about the project based order, for, for a job site or with what Becky was talking about earlier with, you know, furniture with couch and the cushions and, you know, different components, maybe existing across the network, where you're fulfilling from being able to route those in a certain way and essentially have them as a coordinated fulfillment wave or, being able to, you know, ensure that you're consolidating first before moving forward.

00:48:11:22 - 00:48:41:01

Unknown

You know, you don't want to end up with, the dining table and the 6 or 8 chairs, four weeks later. Right. So you have to be able to orchestrate that and consolidate it. Now, what we often see is sometimes that might get consolidated, into one central location and then deliver to the customer. We we have we also see, though, that the customer might say, no, I just whenever it's ready, I just, I want it to come.

00:48:41:08 - 00:49:18:00

Unknown

And so I think that's that putting it back on the customer for flexibility. And what's convenient for them is the trend here. It's the customer expects to be able to just kind of buy wherever they are and have it delivered. Based on their needs. So being able to support that, is, is very important. And then anytime you're talking about consolidation in a coordinated delivery, you have to be thinking about that end to end tracking and visibility into that tracking process so that they are aware throughout this process what the status is, when they should expect everything to arrive.

00:49:18:03 - 00:49:36:23

Unknown

And you're following through on that promise. I mean, too often I feel like we get the email that says, yep, I'm supposed to be here by March 1st, and now it's July 1st. And and you know, we know seeing on the back end side of that, there's a lot of things in the supply chain and in the processes that help drive that.

00:49:36:23 - 00:49:53:08

Unknown

But you know, for you to take a leg up, being able to address that and make sure that the customer is, is clear and communicated to is the biggest, win here for, for you and the customer? Certainly.

00:49:53:11 - 00:50:21:27

Unknown

So transitioning I think we've talked throughout the, the, presentation here on the importance of OMS. But one thing I'd tee up on this to start with is the flexibility is key. If we go back to where I started talking about, you know, COVID and customers that adapted quickly and they were able to very quickly turn their stores into curbside pickup or a fulfillment node, you know, instantaneously.

00:50:22:00 - 00:50:47:15

Unknown

Those are the ones that one. Right? They they were able to adapt quickly. And you as a business would have to have the flexibility so that you can adjust based on the what the customers are doing, what the supply chain is doing. And and it can't be a rigid process that requires a lot of people and technology changes to make those adjustments.

00:50:47:22 - 00:51:13:28

Unknown

So overarching, super important to have that flexibility so that you can, have the agility that you need in your business. I want to touch quickly on if you are shopping for an order management system you're looking to integrate for the first time, you're looking to replace. I want to talk about finding the right scale of an OMS for your business.

00:51:14:01 - 00:51:43:08

Unknown

There are many OMS options out there, and they're they have a lot of crossover in functionality, but they're not all the same and for good reason. So I really encourage retailers and organizations to buy based on matching your needs, not your wants. It is very tempting to buy in or as it has every feature under the sun. But do you need it?

00:51:43:23 - 00:52:10:15

Unknown

Maybe you want it, because it's shiny, but do you need it? Will you ever use it? Will your business adopt it? So I really encourage you to start thinking about your list of considerations and identifying the business's needs. And I see this done in a very specific way. Most successfully, it is balancing that research between your technical team that will own this actual tool and how it is built, and then the end user.

00:52:10:15 - 00:52:41:26

Unknown

So who is sponsoring the operations side of the conversation and who is sponsoring the technology side of the, of the conversation? And really balancing out that list of needs, not wants together. So I encourage you to look at areas like managing complex orders. If you do not have complex orders, if you are consumer packaged goods, if you have t shirts, if you're doing, you know, same day, next day, two day shipping, you probably really should zone in on how complex are my orders and why am I buying a tool to scale or not to scale for that?

00:52:42:28 - 00:53:03:20

Unknown

Providing accurate delivery estimates. This is non-negotiable. I don't care what scale of a tool you're buying, making sure that you're evaluating this, to increase your conversion rate. This is going to help reduce those bounce rates, and this is going to increase overall revenue. This one is non-negotiable. No matter the size or style of tool that you're looking at and then thinking about optimizing the fulfillment.

00:53:03:20 - 00:53:26:25

Unknown

So reduce those shipping costs reducing the split shipments. Are you orchestrating orders. Are you're orchestrating orders. Does your business need that? Do you have one warehouse? And that's all moot. Be thoughtful about that part of the evaluation. We see a lot of time wasted in selecting an OMS in that area. To me, another non-negotiable is that accurate inventory at scale.

00:53:26:25 - 00:53:52:18

Unknown

So real-time inventory, is it accurate? Is it at scale? Can your data support it? Does it help you sell more? Or are you accidentally overselling or underselling because your inventory is not, modern, mature and, working in real-time for you? So to me, that one's a non-negotiable. No matter where you're looking to start your exploration of an order management, system integration or project.

00:53:52:20 - 00:54:13:07

Unknown

And then what is that kind of customer centric fulfillment that you're giving at the end? So, we like to buy the tool because it works for our business, but how is the customer going to experience it, maybe go through the, experience the buying cycle of an OMS and think with the customer lens on what does this change for the customer, not just for my business.

00:54:13:10 - 00:54:34:25

Unknown

So I would I would really consider that, OMS can be extremely flexible. It can be building blocks, and you can design it to match your operational needs. Many customers need this. So are you buying an OMS that fits that flexible need? Many customers don't need that. You want click in config only and you're in a lane and it's very narrow.

00:54:34:25 - 00:54:52:05

Unknown

But good enough is good enough. So make sure you understand the differences when looking at evaluating an OMS that they have those key modern features, but you're not over buying or under buying for the state of your business today and where you want to be in five years. So every use case is not the same for good reason.

00:54:52:08 - 00:55:14:13

Unknown

And I really like people to be thoughtful in that. Buying cycle so that an OMS project is successful, it gets launched, it gets live, and it actually fulfills the promise that you've made to your leadership. I'll get off my soapbox. I think that's the end. I think that's the end of our of our presentation here. We have some time for a few questions.

00:55:14:16 - 00:55:39:27

Tori (Online Retail Today)

Thank you both for such a valuable presentation today. Looks like we have time for 1 or 2 audience questions as a reminder, if we don't get to your question today, connect with our panelists via the channels on the screen and in the chat. Okay, so this first question comes from Anita. How can technology such as AI and automation improve fulfillment workflows and reduce errors?

00:55:39:29 - 00:56:22:25

Unknown

Yeah, I can take that. I think, you know, with what we mentioned around AI and being able to use the technology, but also relying on data. I think the biggest covering off on the data piece, knowing that the data needs to be accurate in terms of inventory and, and, fulfillment processes. But I think the biggest thing that we typically see there is, taking into consideration, you know, everything that would be maybe typically done with either manual or just basic logic that there are is a lot more, you know, variables that can be consumed and calculated real-time to make that right decision.

00:56:23:18 - 00:56:42:21

Unknown

You know, it can be. And the reason I stress the data is because if you were to just say, hey, I just want to shift and do all of my order sourcing with, I. And if there are flaws in the data, you may be in a really bad spot with how it determines where to source the product from or what it does to the customer's experience.

00:56:43:24 - 00:57:08:23

Unknown

Based on, based on that process. So I think what we typically see is where can we can use AI, based on good data and we can use AI, let's say take the example of like the workflows that we're talking about, being able to look at it and have AI determine, hey, where could you potentially make some improvements that based on the historical data, we could see you would save cost and then look at it that way?

00:57:08:23 - 00:57:27:09

Unknown

Or where could I, where could I have, you know, shorten my delivery time frame, you know, going forward for, for the customer and sort of, you know, that ties a bit into some of the, you know, agentic AI and, having sort of an interaction or dialog between maybe business operators and AI tooling.

00:57:27:29 - 00:57:58:22

Unknown

I think there's a lot of opportunity that we see there, going forward, I don't necessarily think that we have to imagine AI is going to take over a function in the order management system right away. Many retailers are not comfortable with the thought of being hands off, where I do see it being hugely beneficial when it comes to just straight up some cost savings is it will observe and record your typical workflow patterns that your operators are executing within the OMS.

00:57:58:24 - 00:58:18:00

Unknown

After it has enough data, it has seen your model. It will then make suggestions to you so it can be something as simple as a tooltip popping up in your own system that says, hey, we see you do this function 70 times a day. Have you thought about doing this way? Here's why. That, to me, is one of the most powerful AI opportunities.

00:58:18:00 - 00:58:38:25

Unknown

If your data is clean, it's in the system. You're using the system fully. It can start telling you how to do the job better or smarter without intervening. It just it educates you throughout the process. For me, that's one of the biggest benefits I'm seeing for customers in real-time right now. Yeah, I drive the adoption too, right?

00:58:38:25 - 00:59:08:07

Unknown

I mean, it allows the comfort level to be there from the business. Yeah for sure. I do want to squeeze in this last question from Mohammed with rising customer expectations for flexible delivery. What's the fulfillment capabilities that should be prioritized to stay competitive? For me, I'm going with some very basics. If BOPIS is part of your business model, it should be one of your top priorities.

00:59:08:07 - 00:59:33:10

John Vurdelja (Fluent Commerce)

Is having seamless bopis. I don't see us moving away from BOPIS I see us moving closer and closer to it. We have seen trends. This is not even just in B2C, but we're seeing it in B2B too, where we're seeing trends, where buyers are younger and they want to be less connected to humans, which might feel weird to say, but it's quite accurate.

00;59;33;10 - 01;00;00;19

We're seeing account managers wanting to buy without actually talking to another account manager. They want to automate all that. So, being able to complete those transactions without a human involved is a is a trend I'm seeing. And then what is that? Buy online, pick up in-store model with the limited amount of interaction. If you can get that to a well-oiled machine, I can schedule my pickup time where even seeing it go as far as literally drive up, pop your trunk.

01;00;00;19 - 01;00;13;08

No conversation whatsoever type of a thing. To me, that is a big opportunity where businesses are not fully capitalizing.

01;00;13;11 - 01;00;30;18

And that is all the time we have for today. I hope you all learned half as much as I did. As a reminder, if we didn't get to your question today, you can connect with our panelists using the social channels on the screen and in the chat. Before we go, we'd also like to encourage you to participate in the survey that will pop up in your browser after this webinar.

01;00;30;20 - 01;00;51;18

This feedback helps us to continue to continue to produce webinars that you all enjoy. Thank you to our sponsors, Orium and Fluent Commerce. And a big special thank you to our incredible panelists, Becky and John, for providing us with such an insightful presentation today, and a huge thank you to you all for attending. My name is Tori and I hope you have a great rest of your day.

01;00;51;20 - 01;00;59;26

No matter. If. You see.