What future for retail and its logistics in 2021?

En 2020, face à la Covid-19, les acteurs du retail ont plus que jamais dû faire preuve d’agilité, de résilience et d’innovation dans leurs organisations logistiques.

La fermeture temporaire des points de vente non-essentiels a poussé une bonne partie des consommateurs à se tourner vers le e-commerce (et à l’adopter durablement pour certains). L’expérience client et sa manière de l’appréhender ont ainsi muté. Les pratiques logistiques ont évolué.

Faites ici le point sur la logistique du retail aujourd’hui, ses nouveaux défis, et les clés pour vous adapter à ce “nouveau monde”.

logistique-retail

Des adaptations sur les points de vente

Le premier changement massif de la logistique du retail, face à la crise de la Covid-19, a bien sûr été la mise en application des mesures sanitaires dans les points de vente. Après leur réouverture courant 2020, l’organisation des magasins a dû être repensée autour des gestes-barrières, avec l

Some retailers have chosen to reorganise their warehouses according to safety distances, and for most of them this means putting tape on the floor to ensure that operators respect these distances.
Others have chosen to set up a system of half-groups (as Noza Distribution told us) to limit contact between teams. Access to the warehouse is thus limited to a small number of operators and service providers.
Others are thinking of setting up small order processing centres within their shops, to take over from their large warehouses. The aim is to become even more resilient, by calling on external logistics providers if necessary.

but without doubt, one of the elements that has required the most adaptation from retail logisticians is the explosion of e-commerce orders. The consequences were not long in coming in many warehouses: the rate of order preparation accelerated to meet demand

The logistics keys to continuing to adapt :

Continue to make teams aware of the barrier actions on a daily basis. The pandemic remains at the heart of the news, and customers and operators alike need reassurance from this point of view. Whatever method you use (half-groups, reorganisation of the warehouse, setting up of micro order preparation centres, etc.), ensure optimal management of physical flows, without contact if possible.
Optimise the operators’ packing stations to aim for greater performance, but without jeopardising their health. Indeed, faster order preparation means a greater risk of Musculoskeletal Disorders (MSD) and increased psycho-social risks in the warehouse. Therefore, take the time to optimise your operators’ order preparation stations, so as to make it easier for them to pack goods, in complete ergonomics. For concrete advice on this subject, consult these 3 steps to optimise the packing station

un passage nécessaire au multicanal

Avec la fermeture des points de vente non-essentiels en 2020, une bonne partie des acteurs du retail a décidé d’investir le web comme canal de vente. Si le passage au commerce en ligne faisait partie depuis des années de leurs bonnes résolutions, la crise a accéléré la tendance, l’a rendue nécessaire.

Les retailers ont donc massivement investi dans le e-commerce (+6% du chiffre d’affaires des ventes en ligne en 2020, selon la FEVAD), mais aussi dans les marketplaces (+8% de volume d’affaires sur ces plateformes selon l’iPM de mars 2020). Des changements de business model qui ont forcément induit des mutations de l’organisation logistique, tant en termes d’approvisionnements que de gestion des stocks.

Ainsi, selon l’étude Critizr, après la santé et la sécurité, la deuxième priorité pour 2021 des retailers est le développement des méthodes d’achat omnicanal

The logistical keys to continued adaptation :

Adopt the best practices of e-commerce or marketplaces, offering a digital customer experience adapted to your brand image and consumer expectations. The omnichannel experience, based on harmonising customer data across all points of contact, should accelerate in the coming months.
Organise your stock according to the different channels, to limit inter-stock worries and facilitate picking by warehouse operators. Your storage method must be segmented according to the customer delivery channels. In particular, don’t forget to correctly label racks, shelves and containers to facilitate picking and limit order errors.

A change in delivery methods

As we have seen over the last few months, the explosion of e-commerce and the health regulations in force have necessarily led to a change in the delivery methods available to customers. The retail logistics function, which until now has been used to a daily management approach centred on delivery to points of sale, has had to face up to the expectations of customers for non-contact deliveries: a real revolution in the supply chain for retailers!

On the one hand, home delivery has had to adapt to “contactless” delivery
On the other hand, click&collect and Drive have become part of people’s consumption habits

of course, these innovations in terms of logistics management have not limited consumers’ expectations in terms of traceability, responsiveness and simplicity of deliveries. Consumers, in retail as in other sectors, are increasingly demanding the quality of their deliveries… requiring the logistics and transport division to demonstrate innovation

The logistical keys to continue to adapt :

Try letterboxing with postal packaging, to speed up order delivery. These compact but robust packages are able to fit through standard-sized letterboxes on the first pass of the carrier, to speed up deliveries.
Choose packaging that is suitable for drive-through and click & collect. To deliver goods efficiently via these new delivery methods, take care to select packaging with handles or flaps to make it easier to carry, or suitable isothermal packaging if necessary (particularly for the food retail sector).
Rethink your delivery methods to make them more eco-responsible. If your consumers are looking for innovative deliveries, they are no less sensitive to ecological issues. So take the time to consider alternatives to traditional, polluting transporters, especially in urban logistics: deliveries by bicycle, cargo-cycles, eco-responsible vehicles, etc

retail-logistique

Reinventing the customer experience in retail logistics

2020 will have been a year of social distancing. As a result, consumers have sought human contact more than ever, not only with their loved ones, but also with the brands they buy from. The proof: 25% of French people have favoured small local shops during the crisis. And 69% of retailers have noticed a better connection between customers and in-store teams. This is why a good number of retailers have put listening to the customer back at the centre of their concerns: redesigned satisfaction surveys, listening to consumer expectations (particularly via social networks), etc. All of this has allowed them to remain agile and reinvent the retail customer experience in the age of Covid: in fact, 84% of retailers have noticed a positive impact of the crisis on customer loyalty

The logistics keys to continue to adapt:

Rethink the customer journey, both at the point of sale and on e-commerce sites. The aim is to unify all the journeys into a single, omnichannel one, to become capable of creating a homogeneous customer experience at all points of contact.
Personalise your packaging and take care of the unboxing of your products, to boost word-of-mouth and loyalty. Consumers who appreciate a brand are sure to let it be known on social networks: what if you took advantage of this extra visibility by taking care of your packaging? For more advice on the subject, discover how to improve the unboxing of your e-commerce packaging
Payingattention to your eco-responsible image and positioning yourself as a sustainable development player: once again, your customers expect you to make commitments. Choosing more ecological delivery methods is only part of the work on your CSR policy for your logistics: also think about offering your customers eco-responsible packaging.

in the end, it all comes down to this: taking into account customer expectations in your retail logistics strategy, in order to adapt to the new modes of consumption that the crisis has permanently established. Is your company ready to face this “new world”?