Australia – Do You Know the 3 Greatest Marketplace Distribution Challenges for Ecommerce Brands?

Brands who sell on marketplaces are responsible to ship products to as many as 75 different fulfillment centers, or more–and that’s just for Amazon U.S..  Once you add international marketplaces and D2C channels to the mix,  your distribution points get exponentially greater.  How can any brand manage this without losing control or revenue? Pattern, an ecommerce accelerator, has already come head to head with each of these distribution challenges (and more) and has the experience to take them on for your brand.  

By working with an ecommerce accelerator like Pattern, your brand can avoid the complexity of burgeoning distribution points by shipping everything to one warehouse (ours) and letting us do the literal and proverbial heavy lifting. What are the three greatest marketplace distribution challenges for most brands? Watch Pattern CEO and co-founder Dave Wright explain the top 3 challenges and read more below.

Challenge 1: Direct to Consumer

Even before ecommerce, distribution has always been a challenge for brands.  In the past brands had to ship products to brick and mortar stores, distributors, wholesalers, and specialty retailers, so there was still a lot of logistics involved to reach “direct” to the consumer. Now, with ecommerce and direct-to-consumer, the same brands are being forced to break apart pallets, break apart the cases, and individually take out each product to ship to consumers–from their own ecommerce site and marketplaces like Amazon.

Alone, brands do not have the infrastructure or capabilities to do all of that, and need a partner who can aggregate all products into a single warehouse, divide as needed, and distribute from one central hub.  Pattern, an ecommerce accelerator, can manage all those logistics and literal moving parts since it owns its own fulfillment and logistics, including warehouses around the world. In addition, since Pattern owns stock in the inventory, it has the full picture of how products are priced and selling.

By using its data-driven insights to continue to optimize each listing, Pattern is also able to ideate and sell new bundles and other combinations of products to optimize the breakdown and reassembly of each purchase. For instance, Pattern helped YogiTea to create 6-pack bundles to introduce customers to different product lines, while also improving the distribution process.  

The quick sales growth led to the bundles being featured on Amazon’s “Hot New Releases” page in the top 10 new releases, and the variety pack sales led to incremental top line revenue growth, accounting for 14% of all revenue in December 2019.

Challenge 2:  Same Day Delivery

You offer the best quality product at the very best price, but before a consumer hits the “buy” button, the real competition heats up. They want to know, “When will it arrive?” If you go through Google shopping, it’ll say, “arrive in 10 days,” and infrastructure wise it is difficult to get good at logistics for just that package. Then, Amazon says generally 2 days, and maybe Prime same day (or within 24 hours).  

The logistics just got more difficult.  Next, imagine you are in China.   JD.com says 6 hours, and that is across all of China.  How can your brand deliver? So brands think they have a problem with distribution now, but it's just going to get tougher to compete as delivery windows shrink and your brand expands internationally.  Because if your product gets delivered in 9 days and your competitor delivers in 6 hours, you lost the sale.

If this all seems daunting, the good news is you do not have to be amazing at logistics and fulfillment, you just have to find partners who are.  Since Pattern ships from its own warehouses, with a global footprint, you can eliminate a few steps (and days and hours) from production to delivery by avoiding shipping and re-shipping between marketplace’s warehouses then to the customer.

Challenge 3:  International Complexities

Brands who aren't selling globally yet, or don’t really have it as a focus, will likely struggle to just figure out how to get product into countries.  Then, once the product arrives overseas via ship or air, you also have to figure out how to drop ship to the consumer and how to ship your product to mass retail channels (and probably a few more retail outlets, too).  

In addition, every region provides its own complexities, with its own rules, policies, and traditions, which means your brand needs to become local experts in dozens of countries. In the process of going global,  a brand may choose to work with third party agencies or trading partners, and may dedicate too many resources to launch and succeed in the new market. Pattern works with partners around the world, in small and large markets alike, to put the right controls and strategies in place to make sure the deliveries happen and your brand navigates all local customs, traditions, and policies and avoids brokerage fees, unexpected costs, or extra tariffs.

Pattern Solves Marketplace Distribution Challenges for Brands

Pattern, an ecommerce accelerator, has the experience and global resources to help your brand handle its distribution challenges ahead.  Whether the consumer purchased one unit from Amazon, Walmart, TMall, or another global marketplace, or a wholesaler needs an entire pallet, Pattern has the fulfillment and logistics infrastructure and expertise to deliver within today’s timelines. Let Pattern take the stress off distribution with fulfillment and logistics so you can continue to see your sales grow. Contact Us to learn how Pattern will deliver for your brand.  

Want to learn more? Watch Dave Wright, Pattern CEO and co-founder, talk more about distribution challenges ecommerce CEOs must solve.