The Challenge
This home improvement retailer wanted to offer 2-day delivery nationwide. However, their main fulfillment center was on the East Coast, making it difficult to serve the West Coast efficiently. They wanted to expand fulfillment capabilities to the West Coast to reduce transportation costs, maintain high store inventory for BOPIS, and penetrate new markets. The challenge they faced was that their existing 3PL provider required long-term commitments and high costs for incremental SKUs needed to test West Coast markets.
The Solution
The home improvement retailer partnered with Flexe to implement a 3-year pilot program, using Flexible Warehousing Infrastructure in a west code node to fulfill orders across the Western US. This began with an initial 12-month fulfillment test, allowing them to experiment with eCommerce and ship-from-store operations, evaluate optimal inventory levels, and test seasonal demand fluctuations. Flexe’s solution provides the retailer with a low-risk option to test-and-learn what works in their network with more flexibility and cost-effectiveness compared to traditional 3PLs. Flexible Warehousing Infrastructure, enables them to adjust operations with seasonality or demand shifts, maintain SKU flexibility, and avoid significant CapEx investments.
Results
Today, Flexe stands as the manufacturer’s preferred partner for any new facility requirements in North America. Flexe’s value proposition is clear: a unified platform
This pilot enabled the retailer to experiment with fulfillment options, achieve faster shipping (1-2 day), enhance the customer experience, improve competitiveness, and establish a foundation for 1-day shipping in underserved markets. The retailer was also able to maintain its BOPIS (Buy Online, Pick Up In-Store) offering while optimizing store inventory levels, and test ship-from-store capabilities to assess potential expansion opportunities. By leveraging Flexe’s Data Intelligence insights, the retailer built out a regional online item master to improve product availability. The west-coast facility served as a strategic starting point for further expansion and optimization of the fulfillment network.
Flexe’s Flexible Warehousing Infrastructure enabled the retailer to establish a fulfillment center, strategically positioned to serve the underserved West Coast market. This strategic expansion allowed the retailer to achieve its goal of 2-day shipping nationwide by reducing transit times and costs for deliveries to the West Coast.
