To be sure there are many among us who would love to be a
beer distributor. All that glorious
liquid stacked as high as the ceiling, packed to the gills with every flavor
for every palate. And in the quest to
have a beer for every pallet, how do you organize the traditional high volume
brands with the latest and greatest craft beer?
What product should be stacked?
What product to be stored at a specific temperature? How do you re-introduce returned
product? How do I keep my order pickers
as efficient as possible? How do I keep
my customers happy? How do I deal with
slower moving products that use up my warehouse space and slow my pickers down? How do I keep my main brewers happy? So many questions, considerations and
planning to deal with, perhaps a beer distributor’s life is harder than I
thought.
As there are many financial analysts from within and outside
the beer industry looking at trends and forecasting the future, there are
several points to take away as you examine your existing beer distribution
warehouses and plan for new ones.
·
As people age they tend to drink less beer. According to analysts, baby boomers and
retirees are a larger percentage of the population than young adults.
·
Liquor and wine sales are rising at the expense
of beer sales. How do you slot the
products that are ancillary to beer?
·
Craft beers are increasing with 2,700 breweries
in the US alone and how you slot these cases and pallets will need to be
different than the main brands? As craft
beers usually cost more they are big potential profit generators. Being able to store pick and ship them
efficiently is a competitive advantage.
·
Other non-alcoholic products such as water and
mixers are growing but are small in terms of overall demand. You need to carry it but how do you store it?
Beer demand and tastes are changing rapidly. Doesn’t it make sense to develop storage,
picking and shipping plans that are based on product velocity analysis and
accurate slotting? Understanding the
dimensions of your product, coupled with the use of sales data that reflects
the demand for each SKU will allow you to store pick and ship the right product
in the most efficient manner. Done
properly, slotting your facility will reduce labor, maximize the use of
available warehouse space and most importantly of all, allow you to examine it
at regular intervals to keep up with the changing tastes dynamic.
Here’s to great success in 2014 to all the beer distributors
out there as I do my part to help keep you in business.
For more information from Greg, view his page at
www.trifactor.com/greg
