In many ways, your business can relate to day-to-day tasks at your home. Even simple things like putting away your groceries or showing up to a birthday party can seem pretty relevant from the right perspective…
Unpacking the Groceries
Imagine yourself coming home from the grocery store.
You bring the grocery bags in from the trunk of the car, walk around to the back of the house, and throw everything in the shed out back. Perfect, right?
Wrong.
You store your groceries in the places they will keep fresh the longest. Cereal and pasta goes in the pantry. Milk and veggies go in the fridge. Popsicles and chicken breasts go in the freezer. You’ve just kept your shopping trip from being a total waste of time and money.
Life of the Party
Now, imagine that you’re going to a birthday party. You’ve been asked to bring the ice cream. You live in, say, St. Louis, and the party is just outside of Chicago. Do you pick up the ice cream at your local grocery store before you drive the 5 hours up to Chi-town?
No.
Once you get to Barrington, you stop at a grocery store and pick up some Ice Cream. You arrive at the party a hero.
What Does Any of This Have to Do With Your Business?
Your company produces goods. Maybe you make one specific item to cater to one specific industry, and maybe you have a vast array of commodities available to the public at large. Whatever it is that you’re offering, there’s likely a perfect temperature range and a perfect location at which to store it.
Your Groceries – Your Goods
Just as you take care to keep your lettuce crisp and your pie crust frozen, your goods should be warehoused in a facility that ensures the highest quality and the longest shelf-life. Just as you wouldn’t throw your milk in the pantry, you don’t want your company’s candy bars getting stowed away in a corrugated metal storage sauna.
Whether it’s ambient/cool, refrigerated, frozen, or a mixture of them all for different offerings, make sure that whoever is providing your warehousing has adequate amenities for your product.
Get to the Party On Time and At Temperature
It’s important to have fulfillment hubs that meet your space and location needs. It’s easier to pick up the ice cream right before the party, and it makes sense to have warehousing close to your regional commerce hubs. Shorter LTL trips make sense for your products and for your bottom line.
Some other great ways that temporary or regional warehousing can benefit your company:
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Take stress off of current warehouses due to Q4 sales. Look for 3-6 month contracts for warehousing to deal with overflow
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If you’re opening a new plant, you’ll need short-term storage that’s in close proximity to the new plant or the current site
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It makes sense to have regional warehousing for specific areas. It’s not always convenient to have only coastal storage.
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If your products come in by shipping containers, you might benefit from a midwestern storage location while awaiting further shipments on the “slow boat from China.”
Don’t leave yourself with bags of bad food and a tub of melted ice cream. Your company is important. Your products are important. By ensuring that you’ve considered the ins and outs of different warehousing options, you’re doing a service to your company, to yourself, and to your customers.
