Objective
Life Time needed to find a strategic fulfillment partner that could not only assist in streamlining their supply chain management for club deliveries but also fulfill their online eCommerce orders from their massive member base.
Result
The previous challenge involved their many suppliers making daily deliveries into their clubs throughout the day. Because they do not have loading docks in their clubs for deliveries, all product is received through the front door of the facility. This created a negative experience for their members that they wanted to avoid.
BIG worked with them on an improved solution whereas all supplier inventory purchased by them would deliver to BIG’s 3PL fulfillment center. In a coordinated effort with Life Time, our IT teams built technology to retrieve order data from their website so orders flow directly into our fulfillment center. Together, a coordinated schedule was built where the clubs would place one order for all products needed in their clubs every two weeks. BIG would then pick/pack and ship palletized orders of all goods into one delivery to the clubs. Each order is now delivered on the same day of the week at the same time of day so that they can coordinate staffing to receive the goods into the appropriate areas of the facility.
Additionally, because we have the ability to convert products from case to each unit of measure, we are also able to fulfill their member eCommerce orders placed on their company website and then flow directly into BIG’s fulfillment center for daily pick/pack.
Outcome
The program eliminated the previous member distractions. It has allowed them to efficiently utilize their clubs staffing model around a focused time/day of the week to receive their orders into the appropriate areas of the facility. It provided major savings to them in the reduction of overall transportation costs as they now have one shipping cost versus multiple daily shipping charges from many suppliers. BIG is also able to provide them robust administrative support including the processing of returns, weekly reporting to help them manage stock to sales effectively, and Lot Tracking capabilities to manage product expiration dates and FIFO.
The overall process has been a huge success and brought major cost savings and efficiency to them for the past 8 years.