Overnight Shipping: How does it increase revenue?
27 July 2021
Overnight shipping is crucial to help businesses stand out. In today’s fast-fashion retail environment various links in the pre-production process need to collaborate in order to meet retail deadlines.
Due to the current development and approval process of samples, and sourcing and testing of material, apparel manufacturers are required to send items with high urgency. This makes overnight shipping an essential component in maintaining an efficient supply chain.
What is Overnight Shipping?
Overnight shipping, also referred as express courier shipments, guarantee that retailers receive urgent shipments the next business day. There are a variety of factors to be kept in mind when selecting a logistics provider for the best overnight shipping.
Pricing, shipment weight, shipment size, cut-off times, routing, and collection points, are important elements to assess for apparel manufacturers and fast fashion retailers.
Pricing: Overnight shipping pricing is based on the direct costs affiliated with the transport. Retailers should consider both their budget and customer needs when calculating shipping costs.
Shipment weight: The weight of the shipment is typically expressed in kilograms, and includes the weight of content, containers, cartons, or boxes.
Size of the shipment: The shipment size refers to the dimension of the package. Retailers should take cm as the basic unit of measurement, and measure the width, height, and length of the package.
Shipment cut-off times: Shipment cut-off times represent the latest time cargo may be delivered to a schedule truck or flight for loading. Later cut-off times provide more flexibility for retailers and manufacturers and are therefore often preferred.
Routing: The shipment routing is a key element in overnight shipping as retailers often prefer direct flights over transit flights for urgent deliveries. However, despite being slower, at times transit flights still provide retailers with feasible overnight delivery options.
Maximising supply chain efficiency
As manufacturers and retailers are spread out across the globe, time zones differences would interfere with the pre-production process in the absence of overnight shipping. Consequently, both parties are negatively affected by a supply chain process that is slowed down.
Manufacturers transport garments to retailers on numerous occasions throughout the pre-production process, starting from displaying their fabrics, to the production of samples with the by retailers indicated requirements.
In case samples are not approved straight away, or retailers recommend further improvements, manufacturers have to make corrections and resend samples to fit the retailer’s requirements. Overnight shipping heavily contributes to speeding up this supply chain process and ensures retailers receive the right samples before retail deadlines.
Express courier solutions ensure retailers receive the final version of samples within the shortest possible time, which leads to optimised production planning for material sourcing, costing, manufacturing capacity, testing procedures and line planning. Conversely, not making use of overnight shipping has a negative impact on the afore mentioned processes.
Click here to view 6 ways of maximising efficiency for your supply chain!
Building trust between manufacturers and retailers
An imperative matter which is often overlooked is the trust that is being built between manufactures and retailers through overnight shipping. Working as partners, they are complementary to each other. As overnight shipping is one of the quickest delivery options available, manufacturers offer the best possible service to retailers, and vice versa.
Through a trust-based relationship, manufacturers and retailers work together to increase revenue. Naturally, this long-term brand synergy is ideal for both businesses.
Click here to learn why trust in partnerships is important for manufacturers and retailers or click here to view our courier services!