We Created Our Own Logistics Platform to Bundle All Your Logistics Together In One Place — Here’s Why
These days, the tools you use largely dictate how successful you will be in logistics. The TMS, WMS, and OMS are all designed to connect hundreds of details pertaining to your logistics and business — details that may be happening at different locations far apart from one another.
Considering that cross-border e-commerce is as high as 73% compared to total e-commerce purchases in some regions, it's important to work with providers across the globe.
Software like TMS, WMS, and OMS is mainly useful for collecting and creating reports automatically on massive amounts of data on everything happening in your supply chain. That helps you make smarter business decisions.
This software has gotten increasingly popular over the past decade, as an increasing number of e-commerce retailers utilize TMS, OMS, or similar software systems to better understand what is happening in their supply chains.
After 10 years in the logistics game, we at CBIP Logistics are proud to announce that we have crafted our own in-house technology platform, like an OMS with more features and capabilities.
With the pervasiveness of these types of software, you may wonder why we chose to create our own.
Read on to find out about our new platform, Bundle: Why we created our own platform, and what makes Bundle special.
Read about CBIP's Adaptable 4PL Logistics Services
Why did we create our own platform?
Nearly ten years ago when we started CBIP Logistics, our goal was not tech development. Rather, we wanted to focus on bringing DTC e-commerce logistics services into a market that was lacking them.
We focused on building our product and operations, leveraging 3rd-party technology as our centralized platform.
The goal was to do as much as we could, to provide above-and-beyond value for our clients, and to ensure the viability of our unique model that combines 4PL oversight with 3PL day-to-day management capabilities.
The technology we have used up until now worked well for our needs, but we knew we wanted to build our own product that fits perfectly with the needs of our customers and business model.
Now, we have taken all that we’ve learned in the business over the past decade and used it to build a technology stack that better supports our model.
Related: The Importance of Data for E-Commerce Logistics
How does Bundle support our mission?
When you choose an OMS or other logistics management platform, it's important that it be uniquely tailored to your business needs.
As a 4PL consultant to our e-commerce clients, one of our most important value-adds is the end-to-end management and connectivity we create for our clients’ supply chains.
That means that we have to take every separate step, logistics asset, and disparate technology used by carriers and the like, and keep track of everything to ensure things run smoothly. Not only do we have to track everything, but we also have to keep our clients informed on everything that is going on in their supply chains.
Logistics is traditionally an incredibly opaque industry, yet expectations have risen for total transparency in recent years. In modern logistics, you need constant data on what’s happening in your supply chain, namely:
- Real-time tracking data for end customers and business management
- Alerts for when something goes wrong or when you need to restock
- ESG data to satisfy government-regulated reporting standards
Supply chain visibility requires constant data inputs from all logistics activities happening throughout a supply chain. As a 4PL, we work with over a hundred logistics suppliers worldwide, and we link them all to our technology platform using API connections.
That puts us in a unique position to help gather all the data from each supplier and centralize it all into one platform.
And even though we are logistics people and don’t handle manufacturing, we also are able to coordinate with manufacturers and suppliers, linking them to Bundl to provide a full overview.
With that in mind, we created a tech product to span the entire length of a client’s supply chain, a product that:
- Collects data from all partners
- Provides tracking info for freight shipments, warehouse location, and last-mile updates
- Congregates all invoices in one place to simplify payment
- Gives our clients the flexibility to agilely switch to another provider in our network
How does Bundle help retailers be more agile?
When we are chatting with a potential client, one topic that always comes up is the ways that their current provider is failing to meet their needs. This is really helpful for us because it allows us to see if we can better fill the gaps where their previous provider couldn’t.
When we have those talks, one of the biggest pain points we hear about is a lack of agility and flexibility in their model. Logistics is tough, and it relies on many moving parts going off without a hitch to get it right.
Of course, it is super common that one or two of those moving parts fail, and you need to be able to think quickly on your feet to solve that problem and get things back on track. If you cannot quickly make changes that will fix issues, optimize slow or inefficient processes, and allow your business to better scale and grow, you’ll lose money and time.
Our job is to make sure that problems get solved immediately, and contingencies get put into play ASAP to keep things running on schedule. Bundle is there to make that process as smooth as possible.
We built agility into the Bundle product in a few ways:
- Easy to use, uncomplicated interface
- Real-time data coming in & making it possible to make changes quickly
- Data and KPIs at a glance for smarter business decisions
- Our entire provider network connected and available for clients
How can you learn more about Bundle?
Bundle is up and running now, so you can reach out to us at CBIP to request a demo from one of our employees.
If you aren’t ready for a live demo, head over to our website to read a little bit about Bundle on the Bundle product page.