New GS1 US guideline harmonizes e-commerce fulfillment processes

A new guideline focused on e-commerce and omni-channel fulfillment processes has been released by GS1 US to help the retail industry evolve toward a single fulfillment process for improved cost savings and maximized resources.

The Apparel and General Merchandise E-Commerce Fulfillment Guideline was developed by the GS1 US Omni-Channel Ready Merchandise E-Commerce Fulfillment Workgroup, a subgroup of the GS1 US Apparel and General Merchandise Initiative. The group is composed of retailers, brand owners, manufacturers and solution providers whose mission is to identify and resolve the key merchandising challenges in preparing, packaging and shipping product for both in-store and e-commerce fulfillment.

“With heightened consumer expectations for fast and seamless shopping experiences across all channels, retailers are offering consumers a number of flexible fulfillment and delivery options, such as buy online pick-up from store and buy in store ship to home,” said Melanie Nuce, vice president of apparel and general merchandise, GS1 US. “Traditional fulfillment processes needed a makeover to keep up with today’s on-demand consumer and the corresponding changes to the retail supply chain. With the goal of improving the overall e-commerce consumer experience, retail industry stakeholders have come together to determine the best way to present and ship a product so as to not compromise on quality and presentation, while optimizing sustainability.”

The guideline contains industry best practices for successfully delivering a consistent cross-channel consumer experience. It features a comprehensive description of best practices with regard to units of measure, ticketing a product with Global Trade Item Number (GTIN) identification, packaging, and provides a product-specific chart to help retail industry stakeholders determine the appropriate fulfillment practices for each product type.

The first iteration of the guideline seeks to reduce a retailer’s order-to-fulfillment cycle time. The workgroup is already engaged in developing the next release of the document, slated to be delivered in early 2017, which will further refine omni-channel fulfillment best practices.

Click here for more information about the GS1 US Apparel and General Merchandise Initiative.

GS1 also announced the successful global launch of GDSN Major Release 3, an update to the Global Data Synchronization NetworkTM (GDSN) standard.

The launch brings a new level of speed, efficiency and information-sharing flexibility to the nearly 40,000 organizations worldwide that rely on GDSN to share trusted product data with their business partners in an automatic, and immediate way. With enhancements like richer product information sharing, industry-specific functionality and better regulatory compliance features, the release of GDSN Major Release 3 is intended to empower organizations to respond to new and emerging marketplace demands.

GDSN is a networked product data sharing system that is managed by the GDSN standard (www.gs1.org/gdsn). It contains more than 20 million products. This standard ensures that information, like pricing or product data, exchanged among networked trading partners is accurate. Any change made to one company’s database is immediately shared with the other partners. The GDSN Major Release 3 update takes this process to the next level with over 1,500 improvements, including support for new product attributes and the consistent sharing of imagery that corresponds with those products. The updates are designed to help businesses deliver an unmatched customer experience. For example, through GDSN Major Release 3, application developers will have the most up-to-date trusted data to deliver a better shopping experience; hospitals will gain flexibility to quickly respond to market needs; and improved data sharing will enable retailers and brand owners to track products globally.

“The GDSN Major Release update was developed and launched in response to requirements from industry, business trading partners and regulatory agencies,” says Malcolm Bowden, president, Global Solutions, GS1.

“What’s exciting about the GDSN Major Release 3 is it’s really setting the foundation for the future of commerce. It enables the sharing of richer and more accurate product information for today’s omni-channel consumer,” said John Phillips, senior vice president, customer supply chain and global go-to-market, PepsiCo.

Other industry leaders are also praising the competitive advantages that the GDSN Major Release 3 update brings. “We are going to have more opportunities, more speed and changes, more local approach,” said Vincent De Hertogh of retailer Delhaize Group.

Bowden explains that the successful launch of GDSN Major Release 3 on May 26 was the result of impressive collaboration and dynamic planning amongst all the parties impacted by the update. This includes the data pool community that supports GDSN, GS1 Member Organizations, businesses that directly manage their own GDSN-activities and many other trading partners throughout the global supply chain.

The first company in the world to have sent ”live” trade item information according to the new GDSN Major Release 3 standard was fresh salmon Swedish manufacturer Leröy Sverige AB. Ann-Christin Nilsson, Marketing and Sales Coordinator of the company said: “we are very proud of this achievement which could not have happened without the great collaboration with GS1 Sweden.”

With a successful launch completed, GS1 will continue to monitor, communicate and collaborate with the GDSN community to gather feedback and inform about future updates to the GDSN.