Exploring consumer demand for quick delivery Instant gratification is not exactly a new phenomenon. Impulse shopping is a mainstay among consumers, and it accounts for a decent percentage of all buying in brick-and-mortar stores. The challenge for retailers is to never minimize its impact, whether you sell from a physical location accessible to customers, or operate exclusively online, joining hundreds of thousands of e-commerce merchants. Supply chain issues reared their ugly heads following the start of the global Covid-19 pandemic, but they did not resolve themselves quickly. In fact. Four years after the initial business and personal trauma related to shutdowns and global disruptions, there are still elements needing ironing out. Brick-and-mortar stores are not receiving timely deliveries, due in part to inventory shortages and to backlogs and glitches at international ports. For e-commerce sellers, this is a double whammy. Acquiring inventory takes longer, even if your delivery to consumers is handled by a third party or shipped direct from distributors. And if you manage your own shipping duties, you’ve noticed the dramatic increase in costs spread among all entities (USPS, UPS, FedEx, and more). At the same time, shipping services continue to stretch out delivery dates. It’s a genuine problem. Your business model is based on the rapid turnaround time consumers expect. So what do you do? Analysts have a few pieces of advice, though no quick fixes. Consider these options:
Finally, the emergence of AS (Anticipatory Shipping) has been a lifesaver for mid- to higher-volume merchants taking advantage of tools that evaluate and project consumer purchases. These will streamline choices of delivery agents. techDetector explains this masterfully. Photo by CHUTTERSNAP on Unsplash
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