13. Supply Chain Management
Vignette: Grocery Gateway is a robust model where you can fill your shopping cart 24/7 then choose a convenient time for home delivery of your items from organic and specialty items like wine and lottery tickets to the food, household and drug store goods needed to fill your fridge and pantry.
Featured URL: http://www.grocerygateway.com
Taking Stock
A successful grocery site needs to be customer-centric, driven by customer's lifestyles. The grocery buyer drives the product assortment, placement, pricing and promotion. Grocery companies on line have a number of challenges: solve customer needs, improve profits, hire the best people, lock in customers, organize and choreograph distribution of goods, services and information. A good database system is needed to monitor stock to keep up with customer demands. Ideally the system would alert the customer as to their needs based on previous buying patterns.
In this grocery business, email replaces flyers and junk mail. Customers don't want to deal directly with a manufacturer to buy laundry soap for example. They have no time to search and evaluate products worthy of stocking the grocery shelves. For this they depend on an organization that selects and organizes a wide variety of goods to choose from at reasonable prices allow manageable and convenient selection and delivery, matching customer needs to goods and convenient delivery.
Visit the Grocery gateway site and register to shop there. Plan a party for a dozen friends to celebrate an upcoming holiday. Create a shopping list of 20-30 items you'd like to have to prepare for this event. Select a variety of items from different sections of the store based on what you plan to serve. You can go through most of the process of filling your cart, saving your shopping list and selecting a delivery time before ending your visit.
Write a review of your experience (250 words), comparing your online shopping experience with the way you would be shopping for the same items if you were going about your area to bricks and mortar shops to collect these party items.
Shopping Sites
Peapod.com - http://www.peapod.com/
Online Grocer.ca - http://www.onlinegrocer.ca/shop/home.asp
NetGrocer - http://www.netgrocer.com/
Petco.com - http://www.petco.com/
Shopping Articles
Groceries on the Web
"Grocery Gateway builds 'total brand personality'" - Strategy Marketing Magazine report.
"Cisco and NetGrocer.com: Eliminating Runaway Shopping Carts " - Cisco Systems Solutions
Why Peapod is Thriving: First-Failure Advantage - Business 2.0
What Went Wrong?
"Webvan delivers its last word: Bankruptcy" - CNet.com
"Workers bitter, bittersweet as Webvan folds" - CNet.com
Petopia.com - InfoWorld
Petco Gobbles Up Petopia's Assets - E-Commerce Times
Strategies and Solutions
"Fewer Unhappy Returns" - Business2.0
"The Missing Link: What You Need to Know About Supply-Chain Technology" - Business 2.0
Instructors: Optional Activities
As with all of the Web exercises, the exercise for Chapter Thirteen can be used as suggested or certain parts can be adapted to better suit your student population. You will want to estimate how much time is required to complete any part or all of the parts. It will be helpful to give students a suggested time frame for completing their assignments. It will also help to determine how much credit might be given for the assignment.
1. Top Honours
Visit the four shopping sites given in the Resource section. Using the
following goals as guidelines, choose which shopping site best
a. solves customer needs
b. looks to be profitable for the investors in the business
c. assures potential buyers of good customer service
d. develops the effective strategies for winning shopper loyalty
e. organizes the items in a helpful manner
f. sets up delivery options for customer convenience
g. makes it easy to navigate and place orders
h. displays a visually appealing and attractive site
i. gives extra incentives to online shoppers
2. Bad News/Good News
a. Read the four articles labeled "What Went Wrong" in the Resource section.
b. Give a brief point by point history of the downfall of WebVan and Petopia.
c. What can be learned from their mistakes?
3. Behind the Scenes
Read the articles in Strategies and Solutions in the Resource section.
What can be done to reduce returns for a CD or book supplier. How do Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com handle returned books?
How can supply chain technology be helpful to companies like ColumbiaHouse and CDNow?