Articles & Whitepapers

Although the 2007 holiday season hasn’t ended yet for many multichannel merchants, many of our clients are already preparing for holiday 2008. You should, too, by conducting a post-season audit. This process enables you to challenge your group to find ways to reduce costs and at the same time get critical data and observations to be used for the next holiday season.

In the next few weeks, all the carriers will complete their 2008 pricing announcements. As we look at the future, it’s probably a good bet that these carriers’ rates aren’t going down any more than the cost of oil. So what’s the impact and action plan for your business? Given the size of the increases that have been announced so far, multichannel companies need to look at all the options open to them and develop short and long-term strategies to reduce the impact.

Promises, promises.  All businesses make them, but the best actually deliver what Marketing promises.  Now is the time to conduct a post mortem of how well your multichannel business performed this past Holiday and to develop plans for improvement for the coming Holiday Season.  Some fourth quarter businesses experience a 10:1 peak to average daily volume in the call and fulfillment centers; that sheer volume means you must be well organized and efficient to stay current.

The Increasing Importance Of Integrated, Multi-carrier Shipping And Transportation Management For Direct and Multi-Channel Merchants

September 2007

F. Curtis Barry & Company provides due diligence services to potential investors in the multichannel retail arena to investigate the feasibility of, or provide support for, mergers, acquisitions, and/or investment opportunities. Our perspective is one of operational consultants for multichannel retail businesses—companies that operate some combination of direct-to-customer sales (catalog and e-commerce), retail (brick-and-mortar), and/or wholesale channels.