So Black Friday/fiveday/cyber Monday has drawn to a close and – touch wood – so far no disaster stories in the world of delivery. It seems that retailers and their partners have taken note of lessons learnt from the past.
That’s not to say the market isn’t under intense pressure as they strive to hit deadlines and both retailers and carriers must keep an eye on everything they are doing. Personally I’ve already had one rather disastrous Black Friday fail after an electric item was dropped over a 6 ft gate – unwrapped and therefore seen by my daughter. It really isn’t rocket science to know that items could be Christmas presents and therefore deserve a little more care and attention.
Whilst that was a rather epic fail I do symphasise and know the job of delivery driver is far from easy – with expectations driven by the desire for fast delivery but is fast something we always need? Not necessarily. In my case it was simply an option that I took because it was there. I could have waited and therefore the pressure on the delivery chain could have been lessened. Is that another lesson retailers and their carriers need to learn?
Fuelling the desire for immediacy are initiatives such as ASOS’ same day delivery service which is now expanding beyond London after an initial trial in the capital.
One way to ease the pressure – especially during peak – is delivering to third party locations such as click and collect networks. Doddle has revealed how partnerships in locations such as Cancer Research charity stores are driving both footfall and spend for such retailers – a great example of online retail fuelling high street spend too.
Also in the world of click and collect is the news that Yodel, owner of CollectPlus, has now appointed CollectPlus CEO Neil Ashworth in a new role at the company. He will maintain his CEO position of CollectPlus too.
Internationally Ocado Solutions and Groupe Casino have agreed a new international partnership which will see the French giant adopt Ocado’s technology amongst its formats, the first being Monoprix.fr.
Such partnerships are vital to driving innovation in the market and in our opinion piece this week Richard Harris, managing director of Diamond Logistics, explains how innovations can help you grow your ecommerce marketplace.
And finally we hear about a Tesla order DHL Supply Chain has made as it seeks to continue to innovate in its green logistics strategy. It will test the trucks from 2019.
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