strategicinsight
BY DAVID MALONEY, SENIOR EDITOR
High-tech DC
revitalizes
iHerb’s
operations
Online retailer’s fulfillment
activities get a shot in the
arm with the opening of a
new automated DC.
FOR A DOT-COM RETAILER, THE DISTRI-
bution center is much more than a ware-
house. It is a storefront, fulfillment depot, and customer service center all rolled into
one. Unlike brick-and-mortar retailers, online merchants can’t offer customers the
opportunity to see and feel the product they’re ordering. What they can do is offer a
much wider selection than can be found in stores and provide superior customer
service. iHerb.com aims to excel on both counts.
iHerb.com is a pure-play dot-com retailer that offers some 30,000 wellness-orient-
ed health and natural organic products. This includes vitamins, sports nutritional
products, supplements, health care items, earth-friendly cleaning products, and
housewares.
“Anybody young, old, in shape, out of shape; anybody looking to better their per-
formance; anybody looking to better their health … that’s the kind of customer we
are looking for,” says Craig Smith, director of operations at iHerb’s new distribution
center in Moreno Valley, Calif.
iHerb’s pledge to customers is that any order received by 1 p.m. PST will ship the
same day. That’s a tall order that requires a combination of sophisticated voice and
put-to-light technology to facilitate swift order turnaround. Adding to the challenge,
the operation has to be able to accommodate the small (one- to 10-item) quantities
that make up a typical Internet order.
