If you are interested in logistics, then 2 of the best companies to watch and learn from are Amazon and Wal-mart. If you are interested on You Tube, companies such as the Wall Street Journal videos can by found which are interesting to watch and there are others.

In an article by Haleluya Jadero and Anne D’innocenzio of the Associated Press, Amazon, Wal-Mart and Target are working hard to increase their shipping speeds to please shoppers expecting faster and faster deliveries.

Amazon is the fastest at speed of delivery followed by Wal-Mart, Target, Shein and Temu.

Amazon has a built in advantage over the others because of Prime membership. A customer pays $139 a year for free 2 day shipping and other perks. The way same day delivery works is Amazon stocks the top 100,000 products customers want in smaller distribution centers located in 8 parts of the country. The idea is have shipments travel shorter distances with fewer touch points, this speeds up delivery and cuts costs.

Before the changes, Amazon shipped everything from massive distribution centers. In July, Amazon said 76% of customer orders were being fulfilled within the 8 regions, up from 62% before the change.

Neil Saunders, managing director of GlobalData Retail, said psychologically, fast delivery is very important to the consumer when ordering online. However, it is expensive to support and often requires a lot of new infrastructure.

Wal-Mart is planning catch up to Amazon, and its model uses from than 4,000 stores as fulfillment centers and delivery hubs for online orders. In addition, Wal-Mart is adding 40 parcel stations to stores in 9 states to process more goods to get them faster to customers.

Both Wal-Mart and Amazon use a high level of automation to help speed up deliveries. Walmart is automating all of its 42 regional distribution centers which hold non-perishable items. In terms of perishable items, Walmart is building 4 automated warehouses. As well it is planning to add more than 100 smaller facilities that are connected to its stores and handle online orders.

Walmart has 3 fully automated next generation fulfilment centers which hold the most wanted items. The company says it has reduced the number of steps to pack and ship orders from 12 steps to 5 steps. The goal is to increase online fulfilled orders and expand next and 2-day shipping to 90% of the US.

Target is spending $100 million on its own warehouses. The warehouses called sortation centers receive their orders from 30 -40 surrounding Target stores. The company expects to have a delivery volume of more than 50 million packages this year.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, one of the reasons to invest in the first in the class stocks is to maintain their dominant position the companies need the resources to invest in satisfying their customers’ needs and perceived needs. If customers believe they need quick deliveries, it takes great resources to satisfy the demands. By satisfying the demands, that means they will be repeat customers and spend more over the long run as satisfying customers. The problem for the competition is the resources to continuing to meet customer demand and have margins to make profits, which is the reason why it is often easier to invest in larger companies than smaller ones.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.