Supply Chain Channel Strategy
Omni-Channel, B2B, B2C, Marketplaces, Dark Stores, Click & Collect… Is Your Supply Chain Actually Set Up for How You Sell?
Channel strategy is one of those areas where the edges have completely blurred. Ten years ago, you were either B2B or B2C, wholesale or retail. Now? Most businesses are trying to serve multiple channels simultaneously, and the supply chain implications are significant.
Consider these questions, because they tend to reveal where the pain points are:
- Are you running what’s essentially a B2B supply chain but trying to bolt on direct-to-consumer fulfilment as an afterthought?
- Do different channels have wildly different profitability, but you’re not quite sure which ones are actually making money and which are quietly draining resources?
- Are you fulfilling ecommerce orders from stores, from warehouses, from third parties—with nobody really sure what the optimal approach is?
- Have you added marketplaces, click & collect, or same-day delivery options without fully thinking through what that means for your distribution network?
- Is your supply chain optimised for one dominant channel while others get whatever’s left over?
- Do you have a clear view of cost to serve by channel, or is it all just lumped together?
The thing is, supply chain decisions that made perfect sense for a single-channel business can become a real problem when you’re trying to serve multiple channels. Different channels have different service expectations, different order profiles, different cost structures. Treating them all the same usually means you’re over-servicing some customers and under-servicing others—while losing money in places you can’t quite identify.
And then there’s shared distribution. Many companies have shied away from it in the past, worried about losing competitive differentiation or exposing commercially sensitive information. But attitudes are changing. We’ve recently assessed several situations where competitors sharing distribution facilities or delivery transport makes genuine sense—done within strict confidentiality boundaries, of course. It’s worth at least asking the question.
Getting channel strategy right requires a clear view of where value is being created and destroyed across your different routes to market. That’s where we can help.
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What We Can Help You With
When we work with clients on channel strategy, we’re typically trying to answer one fundamental question: is your supply chain set up to support how you actually sell, or is it fighting against it? Here are the areas our work often focuses on:
- Articulation of contributions from different customers and customer groups – Using cost to serve analysis to understand which channels, customers, and segments are genuinely profitable and which are eroding margin. You can’t make good channel decisions without this foundation.
- Testing and developing ecommerce distribution solutions – Working out how to fulfil online orders efficiently, whether that’s from dedicated fulfilment centres, stores, dark stores, or a hybrid approach. There’s no one-size-fits-all answer here.
- Gaining clear direction on how to achieve optimum profitability from different channels – Not all channels deserve equal investment. We help you work out where to focus resources and where to pull back.
- Ensuring service alignment to meet profit objectives – Making sure you’re offering the right service levels to the right customers. Over-servicing unprofitable channels is a common trap.
- Creating cost alignment to meet profit objectives – Restructuring your supply chain costs so they match the value being generated by each channel, rather than cross-subsidising underperformers.
- Shared distribution assessment – Evaluating whether sharing facilities or transport with other businesses (including competitors) could reduce costs without compromising service or confidentiality.
Depending on your situation, you might need a comprehensive channel strategy review, or you might just need clarity on one specific issue. Either way, the goal is a supply chain that’s genuinely aligned to how you go to market.
How to Ensure Your Channel Strategy Actually Works
Look, channel strategy isn’t just a planning exercise. It has real operational implications. Here’s how to make sure the strategy translates into results:
- Start with visibility. You can’t optimise what you can’t see. Get proper cost to serve data by channel, by customer segment, by order type. Most businesses are surprised by what this reveals—channels they thought were profitable often aren’t, and vice versa.
- Accept that different channels need different solutions. A supply chain optimised for pallet-in, pallet-out wholesale distribution is fundamentally different from one designed for single-item ecommerce orders. Trying to force both through the same infrastructure usually means doing both badly.
- Be willing to make hard choices. Not every channel deserves investment. Some might need to be exited, restructured, or handed to partners who can do it better. Channel strategy sometimes means saying no.
- Think about where the market is going, not just where it is today. The mix of channels will keep shifting. Build flexibility into your supply chain so you can adapt without starting from scratch every few years.
- Don’t dismiss shared distribution out of hand. Yes, there are confidentiality concerns. Yes, it feels counterintuitive to share facilities with competitors. But the economics can be compelling, especially for deliveries into regional areas or for handling low-volume SKUs. We’ve done this work recently and the results have been genuinely interesting.
Confused or uncertain about your channel strategy? That’s actually a reasonable place to be—the landscape is genuinely complex and keeps changing. The important thing is to get clarity before making major supply chain investments.
Our consultants can help you with:
- Cost to serve analysis by channel and customer segment
- Channel profitability assessment and optimisation
- Ecommerce fulfilment strategy and network design
- Service level differentiation by channel
- Shared distribution feasibility assessment
- Aligning supply chain investment with channel priorities
When we work with you on channel strategy, we guarantee the benefits to your business, which include:
- Clear visibility of profitability by channel
- A supply chain aligned to how you actually go to market
- Confidence that you’re investing in the right places
- Practical recommendations, not just strategy documents
The edges between channels will keep blurring. The question is whether your supply chain will keep up—or keep holding you back.
Need Clarity on Your Channel Strategy? Start Here!
Get your supply chain aligned to how you sell, and one call can set you on the right path. Our consultants are always ready to help, and an initial assessment, totally free of charge, is the first step to discovering how we can deliver the results you need.
To schedule that call just complete the form and we’ll do the rest. Or if you prefer, call us at +61 (2) 8212 9775 or Contact Us HERE. We’re waiting to hear from you.