Logistics Distribution Grasps Lifeline -- Clothing Brand: Shortening "Last Mile"

Compared with ZARA, H&M and GAP, logistics may be China. brand Fatal short board

　 　 logistics Distribution management holds the lifeblood of enterprises.

"At present, Chinese enterprises feel that Management What is the reason? "Lang Xianping asked the Chinese clothing entrepreneur here at an industry forum. "Time" is the key factor in his eyes. "The average garment industry depreciated by 0.7% per day, and only 10 days ahead of time, it will depreciate by 7% and gross margins 13%."

It is said that in the recruitment brief of ZARA parent company Inditex group, the requirement of "logistics operator" post is described as follows: "your job is to prepare the best seller according to the order of the Inditex branch, because every customer needs fashionable goods to be delivered to the branch in time, which is the key to our business success. This way, two times a week, let our stores have new supply at all times, so as to stimulate sales.

As long as such a requirement is met, Inditex even loosened the content that many Chinese companies attach great importance to. "You will work in a promising company. If you want to train your major in practical work, you can also work part-time here. "

It looks very casual. However, in practice, ZARA is quite rigorous: the basic operation of the company is that wherever the production place is, all products will be put together into the logistics centers of chain stores, and will be sent from the logistics center to the stores. And the required indicators are: two times a week, each with a new style to ensure that the store can always have new merchandise on the shelves. The average time of receiving orders from the logistics center to the store is 24 hours in Europe, and not more than 48 hours in stores in the Americas and Asia. To it, "distance is not measured by kilometre, but measured by time units".

It can be said that ensuring efficient and effective logistics control in a wider space is an important factor for ZARA to compete with international high-end luxury brands and compete with similar fast low-cost fashion brands.

"From the extensive market economy to the intensive market economy transformation, the most obvious performance in the clothing brand market is that many small brands will take the place of those large-scale brands. Whether it is a large-scale clothing brand enterprise or a small group of original clothing brand enterprises, logistics and distribution management determines their pace of development, and also affects the lifeline of clothing brand competition. Chen Dapeng, executive vice president of China Apparel Association, said.

In fact, domestic brands also lag behind in logistics. A few years ago, in a large-scale industry activity, reporters tried to understand the logistics status of clothing enterprises. However, only a few companies have been able to talk about the logistics status of some garment industries and enterprises after a dozen or so large enterprises have been questioned.

Poor logistics makes Chinese clothing brands look at ZARA and H&M at their own doors.

In fact, it is not just the clothing industry. In every field of China, logistics has always been a chronic disease. "Last mile" has become the last stumbling block for enterprises to achieve greater profits.

　 How can we shorten this "last mile" and effectively increase profits?

Zhang Chenjing came to the company every day, the first thing was to turn on the computer and see the ERP system. The sales situation of all the outlets the day before was clear at once. She summoned the brand manager, warehouse supervisor and commodity analyst to a small meeting to discuss the delivery schedule of the day.

As a regional sales general manager of Bosideng, she is responsible for product sales in the outlying areas of Shanghai, including more than 150 outlets. In this area, the stock rate of Bosideng is less than 12% (the general stock rate of clothing industry is 30-40%).

"For the bad selling style, I immediately analyze with the salesperson, immediately arrange sales promotion, and the products with high price will be sent to the mall for holiday sale, and the products with low price will be sent to the supermarket for promotional activities." Zhang Chenjing said, in her view, from order, shipment, replenishment, and replacement, every link should be carefully done, and each node needs to be communicated.

"From the factory to the sales terminal, the way of replenishment has changed from one day to three times a day," said Gui Yilong, manager of the company's information department. "At the same time, the replacement must be timely. Different stores, such as small shops in prefecture level cities or shopping malls in big cities, are different in consumption groups, and the same products may produce different situations of selling well or unsalable, so that some outlets may be sold out, while some stores are selling. Gui Yilong said that in order to solve this discrepancy, they adopt a practice of exchanging goods inside the sales company, and transfer the goods between the outlets.

On Bosideng's ERP management system, the product flow from product storage to sales company warehouse to dealer store is clearly visible.

The underwear company, too, has allowed the products to be transferred on the basis of information technology. In 2010, he began to implement the SAP system drastically. The whole group's information system is built on the core of SAP, and realizes the integration of sales, service and other systems with SAP, and real-time data exchange.

Manifen has ten distribution centers throughout the country, serving more than 1800 terminals and nearly two thousand joining clients. "Based on the unified SAP platform, the product scheduling capability of the company has improved significantly. Due to uneven development in all parts of the country, product sales will also be unbalanced, and products will always flow to the most efficient places. After half a year's on-line operation, the inventory turnover efficiency has increased by nearly 50%, and the clear figures have also been recognized by management. CIO Zhang Teng said.

In fact, Chinese clothing enterprises are so few who understand logistics so deeply and so much. But even if they are strong like Nike, they will continue to adjust their logistics. Chinese brands will have feelings.

Not long ago, Nike launched its China logistics center, which covers an area of 460 mu. The company said its clothing product storage and distribution building had a maximum daily processing capacity of 220 thousand.

"Nike has a large number of dealers in the domestic market, such as BELLE, but sometimes some of Nike's products sell very well, but there is no goods in BELLE stores, which is equivalent to the opportunity to make money." Ma Gang said, "in fact, not only Nike companies, domestic brands also exist because goods distribution can not keep up with time, and the product becomes cash slow."

Nike clearly hopes that China's logistics center can change this situation and achieve the goal of doubling the Chinese market revenue to twenty billion in 2015.

At present, the circulation of goods in many garment enterprises is still at a very elementary stage. In fact, if you can not establish an efficient logistics system at any time, it doesn't matter. After all, this has nothing to do with the strength of the scale of the business. Many of the company's current store managers and clerks are also effective ways to deliver goods. But since the clothing industry is originally a creative industry, it is also correct to think about other ways in the creative industries.