E-commerce doesn’t simply sell products but also has to collect them and deliver them to the buyers – at the right time, in the right quality and quantity.

One of online retail’s main logistics problems is delivering products at the right time without letting stocks pile up in the warehouse; this task of harmonising processes is especially important in the case of fresh products. Order picking is also of great importance as orders often stretch across many product groups. FMCG service providers in the online channel are in a special situation as personal contact also matters in their case. Tesco brought a well-working business model to Hungary. Gergely Őri, Tesco Hungary’s head of e-commerce told our magazine that one of their model’s main advantages is that there is no need for separate stocks as the products are taken off the shelves of hypermarkets. Online shop assistants do the order picking in the hypermarkets, selecting only the freshest and best looking products. Products are also grouped this way and categorised in the store room according to delivery address. Tesco Hungary does door-to-door delivery using its own fleet of trucks, applying 2-hour time slots. Mr Őri revealed that Tesco already has so-called ‘dark stores’ in the UK: these are built exclusively for online shopping and goods are moved using complex automatic systems. The investment pays off: online basket value is 4-5 times bigger than traditional basket value. G-Roby Online Supermarket has been up and running for 15 years and uses a different model. Some of the orders are delivered from the chain’s central warehouse but other products are purchased from various manufacturers and retailers. Online selling’s logistics work separately from physical stores’. Sándor Nagy, managing director of G-Roby Netshop Kft. informed Trade magazin that they had developed their own software and system for supporting the company’s logistics processes. Sourcing, storage and delivery have their own manager. Order picking is done manually in the warehouse, using printed orders lists; another person uses a portable scanner to check they got the right products, data is stored in the central system and the order is delivered. Grando.hu Online Pláza is integrated into Vatera and uses a logistics model characteristic of the non-food segment. The online store sells non-perishable food, drinks and pet food. They cooperate with several hundred online and offline shops: they don’t sell own products at all, using the B2C and C2C models instead. Marketplaces business line director Áron Szanitter told us that certain retail partners deliver products using their own logistics system, while others do it via the company’s Vaterafutár service, which integrates the best offers of major delivery service providers. The director revealed that the Christmas period constitutes the biggest logistics challenge. About 25-30 percent of annual sales are realised in this part of the year. Premium pet food delivery service Husse operates in a franchise system. Only human labour is used and network development director Szilvia Galló explained that each partner is responsible for a region; when an order is placed on the company website the master franchise partner and the regional partner closest to the place of delivery are both notified. The regional partner purchases the product from the ‘headquarters’ and delivers it by car. Pet food is delivered the day after ordering, at the time specified by the buyer. Husse’s web shop also takes care of training partners: when products are delivered, buyers receive advice on how to feed their pets. A recent survey by eNet found that pickup locations’ importance is growing in online retail. From the online retailers examined 56 percent offered such a service, mostly using some nationwide network already existing. Tesco uses the drive-in method, for which customers have to pay and is only available in certain stores. G-Roby offers its pickup service in its central warehouse and in Budapest stores – free of charge. At Grando picking up the order personally is one of the most popular solutions. From ‘independent’ pickup service providers Pick Pack Pont is the most popular, with nearly 500 locations all over Hungary. PostaPont locations are also more and more frequently used, thanks to online buyers being price-sensitive