Leverage Logistics Resources and Experience to Meet Growing Demand For Direct To Consumer Delivery

By: Marc Rachlin
VP Nashville Operations Technicolor South East
Technicolor Home Entertainment Services

For the past 25 years, Technicolor’s Home Entertainment Services Division has delivered VHS, DVDs, CDs and games to nearly 10,000 retail outlets in the United States. Studios and other content creators relied on Technicolor’s business-to-business (B2B) fulfillment services that leveraged our well-placed distribution centers to meet demand for packaged media. 

However, as online retail has grown, we have started leveraging our logistics and transportation resources to provide direct-to-consumer delivery for our clients. Technicolor initiated this transformation after noticing that many of our existing B2B clients were looking for delivery service providers specializing in business-to-consumer (B2C) fulfillment services so they could capitalize on the growing direct-to-consumer (D2C) trend.

After listening to our clients, Technicolor expanded beyond the B2B footprint to include direct-to-consumer fulfillment services which, in turn, has led to the development of a new set of offerings that match our clients’ constantly evolving needs.

The advantages associated with using one supplier for B2B and B2C delivery are clear: if we do it right, our clients are able get better freight rates and get one-stop management for all of their fulfillment services. We are – in essence – able to reduce both cost and complexity for our clients.
 

Rapid Response is the Key
 

In the direct-to-consumer market, the ability to quickly turn orders around is vital. As we move to support D2C requirements, it is crucial that we provide our clients with strong inventory management to support this key requirement. The good news is that this ability has been in our DNA for years. You can’t produce and deliver blockbuster videos or games to thousands of outlets within incredibly precise “time and place” delivery parameters without extremely sophisticated inventory management capacity.

On top of this core competency, we have developed a web-inquiry system to offer an additional – and critically important – component that provides our customers with full transparency into inventory, order processing, tracking numbers, and proof of deliveries. But it is not enough to see and manage. You also have to measure the results. To that end, we provide our customers ongoing cost-to-service reporting, which is important to all of our customers, but is especially so to the new clients entering the D2C space. 

In this highly competitive industry, Technicolor continues to differentiate itself by striving to make our customers feel like we are their personal fulfillment service provider. We do this by excelling in our ability to deliver on core logistics and supply-chain management requirements, and then overlaying a set of value-added services – including print, packaging, and an array of other services – to better meet the growing demand for D2C operations.