The world is more connected than it has ever been. According to the International Labor Organization (ILO), more than 450 million people around the world are involved in activities that are connected to a supply chain. Although it may not be possible to eliminate supply chain emissions 100%, there are many ways we can minimize our impact whilst increasing efficiencies.
Local fulfillment
One way to reduce your impact is by having a strong local fulfillment network across continents. By harnessing local fulfillment, you are able to use less emissions-intensive transport closer to where your customers are located. This in turn helps reduce emissions, speed up delivery times and drive down costs, which become savings that can be passed on to your customers.
You can reduce your footprint by storing your products closer to your customer, using practices such as direct injection, order orchestration and in-country fulfillment options, which we will cover next.
Using local fulfillment for even half of e-commerce orders between 2020 and 2025 could lead to significant impacts.
Direct Injection
Direct-injection is the process of consolidating multiple orders for the first leg of their journey overseas, after which they’re ‘injected’ into the destination country’s courier network for final delivery.
It is also the practice of unloading products from an incoming courier and loading these products directly onto outbound couriers, with little or no storage in between. It’s desirable to 'direct-inject' because shipments can be included amongst larger shipments, achieving lower shipping costs, reduced packaging requirements and can be shipped via sea freight rather than carbon-intensive air freight options.
Direct Injection allows goods to be consolidated and shipped via sea freight. Despite the industry being responsible for 1 billion tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions per year, it is still better than air freight.
The above emission factors are taken from Carbon Interface, which in turn compiled it’s data from three sources, all of which have been cross-referenced with each other for accuracy.
The European Chemical Transport Association (ECTA) provides an indepth analysis of transportation methods and their various emissions factors.
CN Rail also provides emission factors for ship, truck and train, and the IPCC provides the an in-depth analysis of transportation methods and their associated emission factors.
Benefits of direct injection over postal include:
Order Orchestration
But what happens once your consolidated shipment has arrived?
Once your stock has been distributed to your chosen warehouses, ‘Order Orchestration’ processes activate a dynamic selection of a location from which to fulfill an order.
When choosing the optimal location to route to and from, several criteria must be considered, including speed of fulfillment, cost of shipping, stock levels, resource capacity, and importantly, proximity to the shipping destination.
With Order Orchestration you can fulfill an entire order from the most optimal location. It eliminates unnecessary journeys.
Nowadays, as people have become accustomed to having their products delivered within hours of placing an order, it’s advantageous to bring orders closer to the customer.
An Order Orchestration approach saves on shipping costs and speeds up delivery. It also opens up choice for more sustainable last mile shipping options.
This approach reduces your carbon footprint by selecting optimal delivery routes and sustainable means of transport.
Moving away from conventional practices can reduce your carbon footprint as well as transportation spend.
Bundling
Bundling is a marketing term for offering several products as one combined product or package. Think of a phone and a phonecase or shampoo and conditioner.
Bundling products brings many benefits. By reducing excess packaging, shipments are lighter, greater quantities can be shipped, you make savings on packaging, and the environment benefits.
By offering bundles you can also help move stagnant inventory and help entice customers into buying more items.
