Omni-Channel Retailer Macy's Invests In New Distribution Center
By Anna Rose Welch, Editorial & Community Director, Advancing RNA
New Oklahoma distribution center will enhance Macy’s presence in central and southern U.S. states
In a further move to strengthen its omni-channel initiatives, Macy’s announced it would be shelling out $170 million to build a new 1.3 million-square-foot, direct-to-consumer fulfillment center in Tulsa county, OK. Construction is expected to begin in Spring 2014. By summer 2015, the facility should be fully up and running, employing approximately 1,500 full and part-time associates working to ensure that the company’s operations run smoothly and that customers receive their orders efficiently.
CEO of Macy’s, Terry Lundgren says that this investment continues to promote the company’s identity as an omni-channel retailer, dedicated to providing customers with what they want, when they want it. “Customers today are shopping whenever, however and wherever they prefer — via stores, desktops and mobile devices — and we continue to invest to meet the customer demand. We have rolled out fulfillment capability to 500 Macy’s stores nationwide, as well as built three major fulfillment centers over the past seven years. Our new Tulsa County facility will represent another significant expansion of our shipping capacity, particularly to customers in central and southern regions of the United States.”
Read how one retailer doubled its fulfillment rate.
Until now, the company has been fulfilling direct-to-consumer orders from macys.com, the Macy’s app and stores through fulfillment centers located in Goodyear, AZ, Portland, TN, and Martinsburg, WV. However, the company has also begun to rely on stores to meet the needs of customers ordering online or via mobile. This past summer, in fact, the company expanded the number of stores by 200, bringing the total number of stores in its fulfillment network to 500. Each day, employees at these 500 stores receive a list of goods ordered by customers living near that particular store. The associates round up the ordered items and bring them to a specific station in the store to prepare them to be packaged and tagged for delivery. On a typical day, a Macy’s store ships 50-60 orders, and on a one-day sale day, 75-100 orders. With Christmas quickly approaching, Macy’s is most likely handling somewhere between 300-400 orders a day from customers needing to get their presents wrapped and under the tree in in time. The more stores with fulfillment capabilities, the quicker customers can get what they ordered online from a location closer to their homes, rather than waiting to receive it from a distant fulfillment center.
Both the ship-from store initiative and the new fulfillment center have involved significant investments in new technology. To enable stores to handle in-store and web sales, the company replaced 40,000 cash registers with new POS systems capable of handling both kinds of transactions. The new fulfillment center will be implementing the latest technology in material handling equipment and warehouse management systems. With the company’s large ship-from- store program and new up-and-coming fulfillment center, Macy’s will serve customers with quick delivery times, and hopefully, see increases in the company’s e-commerce business.
Want to publish your opinion?
Contact us to become part of our Editorial Community.