Problem: Strategy needed for complex 'Drop-Shipping'

[Jarvis]

Here's a bit of a different call for help.

The scenario:
Products are ALL drop shipped.
Products are from about 10 different suppliers.
There are an additional 20+ suppliers whose products will be dealt with over the phone rather than on-line due to the nature of their products.
Suppliers are distributed across the UK.
Products may be any of the following: bulky, valuable, fragile, heavy, unique.
Shipping will initially be restricted to the UK Mainland.

Requirement:
I need a STRATEGY for applying shipping.
(I really don't expect a solution, but suggestions will help).
It is acknowledged that some products, (especially 'unique'), will require a phone call to verify availability and shipping cost from the supplier.
Some orders may need Off-Line using MOTO.

My Thoughts:
I could define suppliers as 'Product Categories'
I could use 'Shipping Supplements'
I could use 'Handling Charges'
'Class' may be more appropriate than 'Zone' (Not sure).
Virtually all shipping will be by courier or pallet services.

I have given this a GREAT deal of thought but keep hitting a brick wall.
I need an injection of ideas.
Any takers?

[TraceyG]

Hi Roger,

I've been looking at this and think I've hit the same brick wall. I was thinking about using weight based shipping and creating a weight range for each supplier and setting the weights in the products accordingly but this would get very complicated for the number of suppliers you have. Also, I'm not sure what you would want to happen if an order had to be fulfilled from different suppliers.

[Mike Hughes]

I always thought you needed to define your Objectives before trying to decide on the Strategy and this seems a typical example.

What are you trying to achieve with the shipping strategy? Usually the key thing from a business viewpoint is to keep the shipping charges easy for customers to understand rather than to realistically reflect your actual costs.

If the customer can't understand what the shipping will cost then they're unlikely to order. From the sound of it you might want to charge per product based on it's type (bulky, valuable, etc) and I would normally do this using 'by weight'.

Mike

[Jarvis]

Thanks for the replies, Tracy and Mike.

Using weights, or more accurately, pseudo-weights as a trigger is an option I had not considered.
Mike, sorry I should have said, the objective is to be able to provide seamless shipping options for as many products as feasibly possible.
I don't want customers to be overwhelmed with irrelevant options and therefore Only to be presented with only relevant shipping options.
Those options that I can't deal within the objectives, I acknowledge that I shall need to speak with the customer.
Indeed, this may be as high as 50% of the products as many of them are one-off and unique and verification of availability needs to be done before accepting the order off-line.

I have a meeting this evening with a friend who works on this type of problem on a day-to-day basic, albeit, bespoke.
In preparation I have produced a data sheet that details all of the options offered by all of the suppliers.

This has highlighted some interesting issues.
Most offer UK based delivery as well as some international.
Digging a bit deeper there are 3 primary methods.
1. Own Courier.
2. National Courier.
3. Pallet Force.

If I take the view that some of the suppliers will have a delivery arrangement that I can't access or can't accept, then if I myself add to the list I have two further options.

4. I use a National Courier
5. I use Pallet Force.

This would mean that I have a pickup from supplier charge that I will have to add but it does mean that I can cover all bases.

I will post my solution when I get one, as I think it may help others with similar issues.

In the mean time, any further suggestions are welcome.