New FedEx Fulfillment aims to meet logistics needs of small and medium retail shippers

Transportation and logistics bellwether FedEx said this week that its FedEx Supply Chain subsidiary (formerly GENCO) has rolled out a new offering, entitled FedEx Fulfillment.

Company officials described FedEx Fulfillment as an e-commerce service that helps small and medium-sized shippers fulfill orders from multiple channels like Websites and online marketplaces, as well as manage inventory for retail stores. And they added that the new FedEx Fulfillment enables these shippers to realize profitable and scalable growth through various mediums, including warehousing, fulfillment, packaging, transportation, and reverse logistics. A core component of FedEx Fulfillment is its SaaS-based platform, as well as FedEx’ transportation networks.

In an interview, Dan Coll, senior manager of e-commerce services for FedEx Supply Chain, said that when FedEx officially acquired GENCO in February 2015, GENCO was focused on large enterprise customers.

“But we were getting requests small and medium customers all the time, and it was just not an offering we had at that point,” he said. “FedEx has an immense passion for small and medium businesses and e-commerce so the natural evolution for FedEx Supply Chain was to offer our operations and technology to these types of customers and to really focus on offering them an end-to-end solution, not only for logistics but also for transportation–all in one offering.”

A main focus for FedEx with this news centers on helping smaller customers have access to a scalable offering through a major investment in the SaaS platform that enables companies to sell into any sales vertical in any number of marketplaces, for retail distribution or through a customer’s Web site. By taking the aggregate all of this different sales vertical information and putting it onto one commerce platform tracking inventory across multiple channels, coupled with FedEx making an investment to integrate with all of the major platforms, Coll made it clear that the platform is geared towards meeting the needs of small and medium sized customers.

“This really gives customers the opportunity to have a scalable offering and continue to migrate into different offerings through FedEx Supply Chain,” he said. “Should a customer get to a point where they need a dedicated facility because their volume has taken off, we are able to offer them end-to-end solutions, and it is all on the same technology platform.”

This development, said Coll, has allowed FedEx to expand in its commitment to e-commerce and small and medium businesses, with FedEx dedicated to serving these businesses in the e-commerce space and subsequently “go deeper” with their clients through a logistics and transportation partnership.

And he added that customer feedback to this rollout has been very strong, with the company receiving a lot of inquiries and strong initial feedback.

“FedEx Fulfillment is the latest in a series of offerings designed to help our customers succeed as e-commerce continues to grow,” said Carl Asmus, senior vice president, E-Commerce, FedEx Express. “Moving goods efficiently and reliably is what we do best. By teaming up with FedEx Supply Chain and utilizing the world-renowned FedEx networks, customers can focus less on fulfillment and logistics challenges and more on growing their businesses.”