Insight
The Omnichannel Last Mile Benchmark Series
Discover your position in the competitive landscape
When thinking about your company's last mile and return services, have you ever asked yourself the following questions: How do I perform compared to my direct competitors? What can I learn from other, Best-in-Class retail segments? Am I able to face new entrants that offer seamless last mile services? In a series of six industry deep dives, we will share our point of view and offer the unique opportunity to have your performance benchmarked for free!
The six retail segment deep dives
For the coming months, we will release every two weeks six deep dives that show the performance of six specific retail segments' last mile and return service. Last mile services vary greatly among retail segments due to the distinct characteristics of each segment. Below we have selected some initial results and themes you can expect in the series categorized per retail segment:
Electronics & Telecom:
The high average product value provides the opportunity to set the bar on high quality last mile services – as well for regular delivery as additional services like same day or at-release delivery, and installation services. But how could the industry handle returns in a more customer oriented way?
Food & Beverage:
This segment is a relatively new entrant in the eCommerce market, with complex product characteristics and consumer preferences to work with – e.g. consumers demanding products fast and products that need to be transported cooled. This makes the last mile supply chain a challenging topic. Although current capabilities are immature, could there be an opportunity to decrease complexity, learn from Best-in-Class and make the last mile more convenient?
Beauty & Care:
Strong lead time propositions characterise the beauty & care industry. However, could the voice of the consumer be used to understand whether lead times are indeed the path to follow, or could lowering costs be a stronger proposition? In addition, could stores be better integrated with the online business?
Fashion & Apparel:
Results show significant deviations in services across this competitive industry. The presence of firms with a foreign back-end increases direct competitiveness, but they lack the last mile proposition local firms can offer. In addition, today’s last mile services are also benchmarked to last year’s proposition. How can it be that the number of fashion & apparel firms showing store stock to consumers on their website decreased compared to last year?