BW Retail Powers up Pick Pack Ship Process for 4x Throughput

BW Retail Solutions was tearing up the turf, selling parts for power sports and lawn & garden equipment, and growing the business at a rate of 30-40% per year! This multichannel seller was shipping more than a million orders (OEM and its own products) per year through eBay, Amazon, Walmart, and its own websites.  

With warehouses in Michigan, Georgia, and Ontario, Canada, ecommerce logistics quickly became a monster to manage. How did BW Retail stop spinning their wheels in the warehouse and win at ecommerce logistics? 

High-Priority Shipping Problems 

Tedious manual tasks and paper-based order fulfillment processes seriously slowed things down, taking too much time and labor to keep up with the company’s aggressive growth. If BW Retail wanted to keep moving forward, they needed two things: a way to get unstuck and a clear path to scalable, full-throttle warehouse operations. 

Tedious, labor-intensive tasks 

“…in our old system, we had someone selecting carriers and service rates for every single package,” said Karl Hessell, Director of Digital Information at BW Retail. The painfully slow shipping process was only part of the labor-intensive operation. With three shifts and 30+ employees on the floor at the Canadian warehouse alone, BW Retail was heavily relying on manual, paper-based fulfillment methods. 

Slow, paper-based fulfillment process 

Fulfillment bottlenecks were slowing everything down, and paper was the problem. BW Retail needed a way to ditch paper-based processes, speed up operations, and fulfill orders faster. “We found that the inefficiency of printing things on paper and operating the way we did as a small company just wasn’t scaling,” said Eric Hessel, COO at BW Retail. 

BW Retail Wins with Faster Pick Pack Ship 

BW Retail started looking for an ecommerce logistics software provider to wedge a board under the tires, get them out of the mud, and roll the pick-pack-ship process at a faster rate. They discovered Descartes and never looked back. 

With the Descartes integrated warehouse management system and shipping software solution, BW Retail finally found an efficient way to ditch paper, organize inventories, train staff quickly, and fulfill orders faster. They optimized the warehouse layout to function with workers running Descartes technology on mobile devices and saw a 4x improvement in throughput and productivity.  

Tools for success: Descartes ShipRush shipping software, Descartes Peoplevox WMS 

BW Retail’s Biggest Wins 

4x greater throughput and productivity 

“Before we rolled out the system at our Canadian warehouse, they had three shifts and 30+ employees on the floor,” said John White, Director of Warehouse Operations at BW Retail. “Now, they only need one shift with 16 people—and the throughput and productivity is four times as much.” 

45-60% greater labor efficiency  

“By taking advantage of the automation rules and carrier rate and service selection tools in Descartes ShipRush, we eliminated that role from the warehouse and reallocated those resources to other positions,” said Karl Hessell, Director of Digital Information at BW Retail. They also reduced the number of employees required to pick orders by half. 

30-40% annual growth supported 

By leveraging the Descartes solution with seamless integration to ChannelAdvisor (now Rithum) and quick training of seasonal employees, BW Retail easily manages peak season order volumes while supporting 30%-40% annual ecommerce sales growth.   

Threats Avoided 

• Limited business growth 

• Excessive labor costs 

• Mis-picks and mis-ships 

Need Help with a Similar Problem? 

No one should have to deal with a slow pick-pack-ship process, especially while experiencing such rapid business growth. If these fulfillment and shipping problems sound all too familiar, we hope you will do yourself a favor and decide to make a change. Let technology lift the burden of manual, paper-based processes, speed up ecommerce logistics, and support your growth both now and in the future. 

Want to talk about your fulfillment challenges and find out how to get unstuck?