I was staring at the box that my unicycle came in (yes, I'm one of those nerds) when I noticed something interesting. It's the manufacturer's box, stamped with their logo and with their Seattle, WA address, along with a Made in China line. The reseller I bought it from was located in NJ, something I noted because it meant a week long crawl across the country before the cycle finally showed up at my front door.
The path this little unicycle took to get to me was pretty roundabout. Built in China, slowboat to Seattle -- or possibly one of the big ports in California and trucked to Seattle -- warehoused, possibly after some American finishing steps but probably not, sold to a reseller in NJ, pulled out of the warehouse, trucked to NJ, stuck in another warehouse. Finally sold to me, and trucked back to the west coast.
I think an astonished, "Good lord" is in order. Here's an alternative, and it's such a clearly good one that I'm sure it's already being done, somewhere, by somebody. By why aren't they doing it more?
Build a nice big warehouse near one of the major ports, or maybe a couple hundred miles inland if that's the cheaper way to go. Then get companies who are doing all the above described, stupid shipping around to use you as their warehouse/distribution system. FedEx, UPS, DHL? You guys would be perfect to expand into this business because you've already got the distribution network and the logistics knowhow to make it work.
Now, once the box gets off the slowboat, instead of being shipped to the US arm of the manufacturing company to be stuck in a warehouse, it's shipped straight to the mega-distribution center. Now, when the unicycle is sold to a internet retailer, you push a button to change the ownership and the package is shipped out to... hang on. It doesn't have to go anywhere, it can sit there. It's sold to an internet retailer. They're smart, they're savvy, they're focused on growth and don't want the headache of expanding their warehousing system to slow them down. At their option they can just let the package sit there, owned by the retailer now, but still in the same warehouse.
When the unicycle is finally sold to me, no truck has to make a daily pickup at some little store in NJ to pick it up, it just gets shipped straight out of the distribution system and is on it's merry way within hours.
There now, wasn't that effecient? 6000 miles of travel and one whole storage/retrieval cycle just vanished. Now internet retailers have a way to expand their inventories rapidly, and yet aren't reliant on slowpoke manufacturers to do their warehousing and shipping -- they've got UPS/FedEx/DHL in their corner assuring fast shipment times, an can be assured that when they say "In Stock" it really is "In Stock." Plus, manufacturer's have just trimmed the length of their product channel. No longer does it take an extra couple days for the retailer to recieve, warehouse, and then ship the product -- once it's in the mega-warehouse, it's ready for customers to purchase.
The path this little unicycle took to get to me was pretty roundabout. Built in China, slowboat to Seattle -- or possibly one of the big ports in California and trucked to Seattle -- warehoused, possibly after some American finishing steps but probably not, sold to a reseller in NJ, pulled out of the warehouse, trucked to NJ, stuck in another warehouse. Finally sold to me, and trucked back to the west coast.
I think an astonished, "Good lord" is in order. Here's an alternative, and it's such a clearly good one that I'm sure it's already being done, somewhere, by somebody. By why aren't they doing it more?
Build a nice big warehouse near one of the major ports, or maybe a couple hundred miles inland if that's the cheaper way to go. Then get companies who are doing all the above described, stupid shipping around to use you as their warehouse/distribution system. FedEx, UPS, DHL? You guys would be perfect to expand into this business because you've already got the distribution network and the logistics knowhow to make it work.
Now, once the box gets off the slowboat, instead of being shipped to the US arm of the manufacturing company to be stuck in a warehouse, it's shipped straight to the mega-distribution center. Now, when the unicycle is sold to a internet retailer, you push a button to change the ownership and the package is shipped out to... hang on. It doesn't have to go anywhere, it can sit there. It's sold to an internet retailer. They're smart, they're savvy, they're focused on growth and don't want the headache of expanding their warehousing system to slow them down. At their option they can just let the package sit there, owned by the retailer now, but still in the same warehouse.
When the unicycle is finally sold to me, no truck has to make a daily pickup at some little store in NJ to pick it up, it just gets shipped straight out of the distribution system and is on it's merry way within hours.
There now, wasn't that effecient? 6000 miles of travel and one whole storage/retrieval cycle just vanished. Now internet retailers have a way to expand their inventories rapidly, and yet aren't reliant on slowpoke manufacturers to do their warehousing and shipping -- they've got UPS/FedEx/DHL in their corner assuring fast shipment times, an can be assured that when they say "In Stock" it really is "In Stock." Plus, manufacturer's have just trimmed the length of their product channel. No longer does it take an extra couple days for the retailer to recieve, warehouse, and then ship the product -- once it's in the mega-warehouse, it's ready for customers to purchase.
posted by Dan at 9:31 PM
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