{"id":14879,"date":"2021-03-26T16:49:17","date_gmt":"2021-03-26T16:49:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.openbusinesscouncil.org\/?p=14879"},"modified":"2021-03-30T17:00:40","modified_gmt":"2021-03-30T17:00:40","slug":"in-house-or-3rd-party-how-to-handle-ecommerce-fulfillment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.footballthink.com\/in-house-or-3rd-party-how-to-handle-ecommerce-fulfillment\/","title":{"rendered":"In-House or 3rd Party: How To Handle Ecommerce Fulfillment"},"content":{"rendered":"
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One of the tougher financial decisions for a new company, especially one that can be considered a small-to-medium-sized business, is whether and how much to outsource certain functions, tasks, and processes to a third party. The initial impulse with a new company is to try and save as much money as possible by establishing efficient in-house teams.<\/span><\/p>\n While there are reasons why in-house teams may be the right choice, it\u2019s not guaranteed to be more <\/span>efficient or financially prudent<\/span><\/a> than hiring a third party vendor. In fact, by the time many companies end up conceding and crawling to a third party, they have many tales of woe regarding their in-house failures.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n On the other hand, many bigger corporations establish robust in-house teams for things like logistics, ecommerce fulfillment, and security and only use 3rd parties for specific kinds of partnerships and business collaborations. Just as there are horror stories from in-house fails, there are plenty of horror stories of small business owners wasting precious money and time on inept third parties.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n So, what\u2019s the right answer? Well, unfortunately, there is no 100% right answer on when to go in-house and when to outsource to a third party. There are a variety of specific factors that must be assessed on a case by case situation.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Ecommerce is critically important these days. It has surpassed traditional commerce in global sales and the survival of most companies depends on it. <\/span>Ecommerce fulfillment <\/span><\/a>involves six basic components: inventory management; warehousing and storage; receiving; pick and pack; shipping; and returns.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The decision of whether a company\u2019s ecommerce fulfillment should be handled in-house or by a third party should be evidence-based and data-based. Generally speaking though, it has to do with your inventory volume. If your business pipeline is relatively small, involving shipping fewer than 100 items in a month, your ecommerce fulfillment is probably best handled in-house.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nIn-house<\/b><\/h2>\n