Streamline your company’s supply chain with Couriers and Freight
Couriers and Freight provide warehousing solutions to carriers and fleets. With us as a partner, it’s easier than ever to access services like cross docking, short-term storage, and last-mile delivery.
Cross-docking is a lean supply chain model that involves the immediate or faster transfer of finished goods directly from suppliers or manufacturers to customers or retailers with little to no handling or storage (e.g., stopping a truck at a distribution centre to put it on another truck without storing the inventory inside the warehouse).
In most cases, finished goods are unloaded from the incoming transport (from the supplier) into the inbound dock, sorted and consolidated at the cross-docking terminal, and promptly loaded onto an outgoing vehicle (to the customer or retailer) at the outbound dock. This saves time and labor at the receiving dock and helps get the inventory on to the next leg of its trip.
Cross-docking enables a leaner supply chain and is ideal for businesses looking to accelerate their order fulfilment process, reduce costs, and speed up the time it takes for products to reach hubs and/or customers. Here are a few of the benefits of cross-docking for ecommerce.
Since labour to store products can be reduced or eliminated entirely, goods reach the final destination much sooner. Shipping efficiency also increases as the bigger batches are broken down into smaller shipments and loaded to freight going in the same direction.
With cross-docking, a business doesn’t need an extensive ecommerce warehouse to cost-effectively get product to their customers. Cross-docking makes for a more efficient inventory management process to support faster replenishment such as just-in-time inventory.
When last-mile delivery occurs from one central location, known as the cross-dock warehouse, it can help optimise your supply chain. In other words, a distribution centre acts as a sorting facility. At the cross-docking location, product is sorted and then assigned to multiple carriers based on the shipment’s destination.
Cross-docking operations involves less material handling, i.e., less need to track movement, facilitate storage, and protect and manage multiple SKUs. With cross-docking, you’re able to maintain a high inventory turnover. Some items also benefit from less material handling throughout the supply chain to maintain quality. This is especially true for perishable items, such as food and beverage items.
Cross-docking is a term that is commonly used by importers and exporters with stable, consistent demand and high inventory turnover. But, almost any kind of business can adopt this process if it fits with their supply chain strategy and infrastructure. Below are the types of businesses that benefit from a cross-docking supply chain model.
Does your business sell essential, high-demand products or perishable items that have a shorter shelf-life?If yes, you should consider opting for cross-docking. Cross-docking eliminates the need for a supplier to store goods before being sold to another business, thus shortening the time product can reach the end user.
With cross-docking, once a bulk of product is received, it is immediately transported via a forklift, conveyor belt, or pallet truck to the outbound transportation dock. This, in turn, reduces the risk of perishable goods crossing their expiry date and offers retailers a longer sales window.
Since inventory typically moves directly from one destination to another, bypassing full storage processes, it becomes easy to manage goods coming in from multiple suppliers, or to distribution centers in other regions
This method enables you to efficiently and quickly receive, sort, combine, and ship loads from different vendors to keep transportation and warehousing costs at a minimum.
A cross-docking facility is a type of sorting centre with minimal storage space. Goods that arrive here are quickly sorted according to inbound and outbound shipments and then immediately shipped out, often within 24 hours.
A cross-docking strategy minimises warehousing activities and labor by immediately transferring freight from one mode of transportation to another at the docking facility as soon as possible. This method helps deliver cost savings and ensures faster fulfilment time.
In the traditional warehousing system, inventory is unloaded from incoming railcars or semi-trailers, and stored within the warehouse. Then, they are repacked and shipped. But, with a cross-docking system in place, orders are fulfilled much faster. This supply chain strategy is used for goods that are perishable, or when juggling multiple vendors.
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