Nearly every e-commerce shopper and retail logistics professional know all too well about the problem of returning online purchases and the massive amount of consumer goods returned every year. Each year around the post-peak season, journalists comment on staggering returns volume and how retailers might attempt to reduce returns with passive-interactive online sizing programs – as if the journalists were informing a first-time audience, and assuming these methods would actually quell the tsunami of online returns. However, there is no band-aid retailers can put on returns, which is why the headline journalists should be reporting on regarding reverse logistics has to do with how global economic and corporate entities are investing in the reverse flow of consumer goods into cost saving, revenue generating, and zero-emissions based systems. In essence, what does the future of e-commerce returns look like in the corporate circular economy?
The Re-turnz team sometimes looks to global corporate initiatives posed by the World Economic Forum – essentially acting as the cerebral cortex of global economic and corporate policymaking – a bell-weather of big-picture developments in logistics strategy and other strategic global trends.
One of the prime initiatives of the World Economic Forum’s ambitious 4th Industrial Revolution (4IR) is the manifestation of the circular economy, where ownership of disposable resources typically deposited into landfills by consumers flow back into a traceable system within the Internet of Materials and into the corporate recycling system of ownership for reuse and recurring revenues, which essentially revitalizes discarded materials back to manufacturers who gain virtual ownership of product lifecycles beyond user consumption. Imagine manufacturer ownership of consumer items and their packaging that stay within their supply chain for re-monetization after consumer use.
Multi-national corporations are investing in reverse logistics tech companies (PayPal – Happy Returns; Affirm – Returnly) to complete their post-purchase ecosystems. Despite these tech investments, they have yet to meet the consumer at the front porch – which the Re-turnz Team believes is a key component to the WEF’s global PACE (Platform for Accelerating the Circular Economy) initiative, where mobility and resources may be challenging for the stay-at-home consumer to come by.
Retailers and consumers are moving beyond the single-use system as well, as outlined in ThreadUp’s annual resale report, portraying pivoting trends in the retail manufacturing industry. As stated by the WEF, the global citizen may one day own nothing and be happy in the lower level rental economy.
The key to unlocking the circular economy in the WEF’s global model is the reverse logistics IoT and supply chain, and more specifically, for consumer goods, the circular economy at the first-mile of the returns journey (the item’s journey from homestead to the drop-off location).
Re-turnz and our at-home and on-demand pickup tech service is a part of the circular solution – a bridge to efficiently and quickly move return items from the consumer to efficient disposition locations through crowdsourced and mission ready fleets across the global returns supply chain.
If we follow global societal trends, where travel, currency valuation, supply chains, and unified global political ties become unstable, we can dead reckon the circular economy becoming more prevalent in our day-to-day lives. Whether or not the WEF’s 4IR corporate utopian vision does in fact come to fruition, Re-turnz is strategically positioned to be a part of the reverse logistics ecosystem for the future.
INVESTMENT OPPORTUNITY: RE-TURNZ
Timing is everything and investment in the reverse logistics sector represents foresight to the next move of e-commerce fulfillment. Retailers are adding flexibility to their returns policies, adding more convenient returns options to their customers, and exploring partnerships to these ends.
Re-turnz First-Mile Logistics is the first-to-market tech platform and the most convenient consumer service, eliminating the returns dropoff journey found in all current returns models. Re-turnz connects online shoppers with on-demand drivers who pick up and deliver return items within the hour – a contactless, seamless, and immediate returns experience from their doorstep. Our model drives consumer loyalty and thus grows retailer top-line revenue through loyalist customers.
The Re-turnz App is the easiest, most advanced, fastest, and convenient service on the market. Return packages the way they came – from your doorstep!
| Leadership: Jose Tamez, CEO; T Brandon La Lanne, CTO; Jamie Myers, Director – Product Development |
| Investment Opportunity: Jose.tamez@Re-turnz.com ; Brandon.lalanne@Re-turnz.com ; Jamie.myers@Re-turnz.com |
| Videos: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJlolxIqfTMg00uYy76rd8w |
