FAQ’s – 3PL For eCommerce

We’re Invenco, the 3PL (third party logistics) solution offering your business a seamless and integrated logistics service that ensures your customers get your products on time and on budget. We offer a fixed fee warehousing and distribution rate on packages you sell at market which gives you tighter control on your inventory management and logistics costs so that you’re free to do what you and your business does best: create, develop and grow your successful online store.

Customer retention is one of the biggest factors affecting the success and failure of online businesses. Often in the early stages of an online shopping experience, the customer will expect to see transparent shipping options, stock availability and delivery lead times. This should all be instantly accessible, ensuring the customer can review their order quickly and complete their purchase immediately. For some online businesses, however, eCommerce logistics is more likely to be done in-house by the business owner and a small team who may not have the stock management systems in place to offer instant availability, and who may not be centrally located in a major city like Sydney to offer competitive shipping consistently across all of their orders. Failing to meet customer expectations early on in their shopping experience is far more likely to lead to customers abandoning their products before they proceed to the checkout stage and complete a sale.

eCommerce is no longer the future, it’s the right here and now. Your successful online business relies on timely and low cost order fulfillment. Happy customers are repeat customers, and they also like to share their customer experience with friends, family and other online customers. When you have a great product that you know the market loves, you choose the right supply chain management solution that ensures your customers not only continue to love your products but love your cost savings and fast shipping rates as well. That’s where Invenco can help.

Our 3PL solution moves your products safely and on time through your distribution network saving you time and money. We give both you and your customers real time insights. Your customers can track their order through each phase of the ordering process, seeing where their package is and when it will arrive. Our management software integrates seamlessly with your existing eCommerce platform which ensures automated order fulfillment services. This technological solution ensures complete order transparency and minimal disruption to your business while its on-boarded into our warehouse.

Customers check out their shopping cart from your eStore and their order lands on our warehouse pick and pack queue. We pick, pack that order and deliver it directly to your customer using the least-cost shipping rates every time that you can pass directly onto your customers.

3PL stands for third party logistics which means just one degree of separation from your business. For every online transaction there are at least two parties involved: the customer and your business. Invenco is a 3PL logistics provider. We are the third party in your eCommerce transaction ensuring that your customers get exactly what they ordered when you told them that they’d get it, managing your stock and shipping to optimise cost effectiveness and speed up delivery times.

When you engage a fourth party logistics (4PL) provider, you are injecting a fourth party into your eCommerce process. That 4PL provider’s service offerings include managing stakeholder relationships between the customer, your business and multiple service providers including picking and pack services, warehouse management, freight and logistics companies, etc.

The advantages of third party logistics are in its simplicity. Invenco offers you our own complete fulfillment services which includes your real time on-hand inventory management which your customers see when they shop online with you. 3PL distribution is a complete freight and inventory management system so you only have to rely on a single logistics provider for end-to-end transaction success from warehouse to happy customer every time. Warehousing and transportation of your products direct to your customers is entirely managed by your single 3PL warehousing service from state of the art facilities designed for efficient, secure and timely handling of your products. We utilise cross docking for fast order fulfillment and optimal stock management undertaken by highly trained professionals held to strict quality control procedures. We are the professional outsourced logistics company dedicated to managing fast, accurate and low cost order fulfillment for your online store.

There comes a time in every business’s growth cycle where expansion and new system integration of cost effective solutions to maintain quality control, accurate inventory levels and high quality customer service is no longer avoidable. In order to see how Australian businesses benefit in the long term by engaging Invenco’s 3PL services, let’s take a look at some example case studies which go through the entire process from start to finish with an example business from a homegrown entrepreneur.

Let’s say that your business is called Harmony Home Décor Australia.

Growth and development phase without 3PL

Perhaps you’re an artist who has created a range of bespoke home décor pieces and you have invested countless hours of creativity and design into your range of products. When you launched your online store, you took time to develop a measured and precise marketing campaign that successfully built a steady stream of happy customers who loved everything that you created. They shared photos of your pieces in their homes across all of the major social media platforms and the exposure continued to build and grow your business.

You controlled your inventory management and logistics in-house. You ensured that every order you received was carefully and safely packed and shipped to each customer and the result was an ever-growing market of new and return customers who loved what you were creating and enjoyed your careful and attentive shipping. Given that you were personally responsible for the individual packing and shipping of each order, there was very little inaccuracy, with most orders going exactly where they were supposed to go. You were not, however, able to manage consistent shipping costs even, sometimes, when you were shipping to an area that you had shipped to previously. Some customers would express annoyance at having to pay different shipping rates between orders and you struggled to drop shipping costs because often the margins were very tight across your product range.

You kept track of your live inventory levels and you had a general idea of unfinished products and the levels of raw materials you needed to keep on hand to fulfil your orders, but you were never sure how much it cost your business to stock them.

Inventory management without 3PL services

As your customers began to grow, you began to struggle under the influx of orders. Maintaining accurate stock began to become a full-time job on its own but your overheads were too high to employ anybody else. Perhaps a seasonal rush on a new product line put you behind on a few orders and your previous and consistent 5-star rating lost a star or two because your customers were unhappy with the lead time on their orders and even more inconsistent shipping rates.

Your online store told them you had plenty of stock and you ensured a 14 day shipping term but when you finally reached their order on your queue, you found that you had actually run out of that particular design and had to send an apology email. Maybe you offered them a discount on shipping to make up for the extended lead time or you included a free gift to ensure that your online ratings and the reputation of your store was maintained. These minor overtures began to pile up and become expensive, forcing your products into tighter and tighter margins. Often the business owner’s hourly labour rate is slashed to accommodate rising operational costs and you found yourself quickly working almost for free.

Logistics management without 3PL

The bigger your business began to grow, the more difficult and more stressful hand picking and packing each order became. You weren’t able to concentrate on creating new designs and products and the feedback from your customers began to centre only around lead times and shipping experiences. They stopped posting your beautiful designs on their social media accounts and sharing their experiences of your online store with friends, family and other online customers. You were unable to update your product listing with new designs because there was no time to create them, and the designs available for sale were never accurately reflected in your stock on hand.

Business management without 3PL

Your marketing campaigns took a back seat and your online content became outdated and irrelevant. When business development opportunities came along like possible joint ventures with major retailers or social media influencers asking to highlight your product line, you didn’t have the time or resources to devote to developing those opportunities. In fact, you were already so over your capacity to fulfil your current orders that the thought of developing anything or boosting your sales was worrying. You had actually reached a point where you were actively trying to scale down sales, but your overheads kept growing because your logistics providers were haphazard and there were too many of them. You weren’t able to generate a fixed price agreement with a single supplier, so you were paying standard rates on every order.

How we can help

Invenco means inventoryConnect integrates eCommerce. 3PL companies like Invenco are designed to remove the stress of your inventory and logistics management by offering you a single service provider who takes care of the entire warehouse-to-customer transaction. In the above example, Harmony Home Décor wasn’t able to concentrate on business consolidation let alone potential growth because of a supply chain breakdown that happened slowly at the start but picked up a lot of speed before developing a serious, negative flow on effect into every other department of the business.

Accurate cost management

Third party logistics companies offer business likes Harmony Home Décor, like your business, a complete solution. We provide a fixed price agreement so you can accurately cost each product and accurately manage your bottom line, lower your overheads and build bigger profits.

Quality control and management

We remove the stress and hassle of your logistics management by picking, packing and shipping every stock order that you receive house in world class facilities designed specifically for fast and accurate stock movement.

Customer growth and retention

We offer your customers real time tracking on their orders which promotes your business trust factor, offering clear and accurate visibility on your stock movements and encourages customer retainment and growth. It also means that you don’t have to worry about seasonal peaks and employing expensive casual labour or about your own cost of labour – the hours you put into to picking, pack and shipping your orders – falling so low that you’re almost working for free.

Seamless integration

Our software integrates with all of the big eCommerce software platforms which ensures that the figures your systems shows as available is what the customer will see when they choose a product from your online store. This also means minimal business disruption while your products are moved into our specialist facilities.

Accurate Australia-wide shipping

We provide a complete shipping and freight solution across the country. You can deliver fixed price shipping rates on every order and rely on us to maintain accurate lead times which keep your customers concentrated on how much they love your products. We negotiate with our shipping companies for the lowest cost rates and manage that business relationship ourselves so you don’t have to worry about it.

Business development and growth

We free you and your business up to chase and act on development opportunities. As your business grows, we offer it room to expand with a flexible scale of warehousing services. When your orders maintain a consistent growth, you can change your logistics solution with Invenco to suit your new business capability quickly and effectively.

Find out how Invenco can help your business to deliver on time, on budget and remain the growing eStore you have already put your blood, sweat and tears into creating. Let us help you consolidate your growth and help you achieve a stress free and prosperous future with a simple and cost effective 3PL solution.