In today’s competitive business environments, retailers, technology manufacturers and healthcare businesses are expecting more from their third-party logistics providers.
To meet these new needs, 3PL providers like SCI provide value added services (VAS), to help their clients reduce costs through a variety of solutions, including the ability to customize orders, maintain product quality, and get your product to the end consumer faster. Often the value-added services being offered by the supply chain provider become the determining factor in vendor selection.
Broken down by business segment, value added services that may be important to your organization include:
Retail & Ecommerce
- Assembly, specialized kitting services, price stickers, labeling, and repackaging, gift wrapping, garment on hangers (GOH), Acceptance Quality Limit (AQL) inspection, apparel alterations and retail returns processing.
Technology Companies
- New equipment deployments & installations, field service, technical support, diagnostics, repair, help desk and ticket management, parts salvaging, disposal & recycling.
Healthcare & Life Science
- Kitting, consumable & medical device home delivery, medical equipment installation, set-up and equipment testing, technical support, decontamination and secure destruction.
Value-Added Services (VAS) for Apparel Retailers from SCI.
Here are the top 3 reasons to select a supply chain provider that has experience implementing a variety of value added services:
1. Changing Customer Needs
At the moment, you may simply require product storage and transportation. However, your supply chain needs may change based on shifts in consumer requirements. If your 3PL partner cannot provide the new services, this can create a disruption in your supply chain, such as having to find another service provider to fill in the gap, or trying to create the additional capabilities in-house
2. Dealing with Unforeseen Issues
Having access to many different services can be very important if unexpected issues arise, necessitating additional services before your final product goes to the market (e.g. apparel that needs dry-cleaning, or a mobile device that needs testing and repair). When a business must employ an additional 3rd party on short notice, solving the issue can impact the entire business. However, if your 3PL partner already provides the required service, implementing the solution is straight forward and eliminates the extra cost incurred with other options.
3. Trust the Service Experts
If your 3PL partner offers broad value added service capabilities, it’s likely that they are providing these services to other businesses, improving their expertise over time. They have already gone through the process of setting up, implementing and executing the services, repeatedly. Experimenting with service providers with unproven capabilities, or trying to implement a solution in-house can lead to a loss of time and money, and most importantly, to an inadequate experience for your customers.
SCI provides a wide variety of logistics value added services designed specifically for Retailers, Tech Companies, and Healthcare related businesses.
Learn more about any of our value added services, or contact our logistics experts via our Ask an Expert form.
