Reducing delivery costs doesn’t necessarily mean choosing the cheapest courier.
For many businesses, the real cost of delivery includes much more than the price charged for moving a parcel from one location to another.
Poor route planning, failed deliveries, manual administration, inefficient packaging and using an unnecessarily urgent service can all increase the total cost of getting orders to customers.
Here are practical ways businesses can make their delivery operations more efficient without compromising the customer experience.
1. Match the Delivery Service to the Actual Urgency
Not every order needs the fastest available delivery option.
Using an urgent courier service for a parcel that could comfortably arrive tomorrow can add unnecessary cost.
Businesses should consider different delivery options for different requirements.
For example:
- Next-day delivery for regular ecommerce parcels
- Same-day delivery when an order genuinely needs to arrive today
- Multi-drop delivery when many local orders leave from one location
- On-demand courier delivery for urgent individual jobs
Matching the service to the customer’s actual requirement can be more efficient than treating every delivery as urgent.
2. Consolidate Multiple Deliveries
Businesses making several deliveries in the same area should consider whether those jobs can be combined.
Booking every delivery separately may not always be the most efficient approach.
A multi-drop delivery run allows one driver to collect multiple orders and complete them as part of an organised route.
This can be particularly useful for retailers, wholesalers and other businesses with many deliveries leaving from the same location.
GoBUNDLE is GoPeople’s multi-drop delivery service and includes route optimisation to help organise multiple delivery stops.
3. Optimise Delivery Routes
The sequence in which deliveries are completed matters.
Poor route planning can cause drivers to:
- travel unnecessary kilometres
- repeatedly cross the same areas
- spend more time in traffic
- complete fewer deliveries during a run
Route optimisation considers the entire group of delivery addresses and helps organise them into a more efficient sequence.
For businesses operating their own fleet, route-planning technology can help improve this process.
For outsourced multi-drop deliveries, route optimisation can form part of the delivery service itself.
4. Reduce Failed Deliveries
A delivery that cannot be completed can create additional costs throughout the business.
These may include:
- another delivery attempt
- customer-support time
- return transport
- warehouse handling
- refunds or replacements
- customer dissatisfaction
Businesses can reduce avoidable failures by collecting accurate delivery information before dispatch.
Useful information can include:
- complete address
- unit or suite number
- correct contact details
- building access information
- appropriate delivery instructions
Small improvements in address quality can prevent much larger problems later.
5. Improve Customer Communication
Customers who know when an order is coming are better prepared to receive it.
Tracking and delivery notifications can therefore contribute to operational efficiency as well as customer experience.
Useful delivery visibility can include:
- tracking information
- status updates
- customer notifications
- delivery progress
- proof of delivery
Better visibility can also reduce “Where is my order?” enquiries to the business.
6. Review Your Packaging
Packaging affects more than product presentation.
Oversized or unnecessarily heavy packaging can increase material use and make parcels less efficient to handle.
Businesses should consider:
- appropriate box sizes
- unnecessary empty space
- packaging weight
- product protection
- void-fill material
- ease of handling
The objective isn’t to minimise packaging at all costs.
Packaging still needs to protect the product throughout the delivery journey.
A damaged product that needs replacing and delivering again is unlikely to represent a genuine saving.
7. Reduce Manual Delivery Administration
As delivery volumes grow, manual processes can become expensive.
Staff may spend time:
- entering delivery details
- copying addresses between systems
- booking individual deliveries
- sending tracking information
- checking delivery status
- finding proof of delivery
Where practical, businesses should look for opportunities to integrate or automate repetitive delivery processes.
The benefit isn’t only saving staff time. Automation can also reduce data-entry errors.
8. Use Next-Day Delivery for Regular Parcel Volumes
For ecommerce businesses, not every parcel needs a dedicated same-day courier.
A next-day delivery operation can consolidate parcels through a delivery network rather than treating every order as an individual urgent job.
GoEXPRESS provides next-day parcel delivery for businesses sending regular volumes from warehouses in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane.
This can suit ecommerce retailers and other businesses looking for a repeatable daily parcel-delivery process.
9. Measure More Than the Price Per Delivery
When reviewing delivery costs, don’t look only at the courier invoice.
Consider the broader operational impact.
Useful measures can include:
- delivery cost per order
- failed-delivery rate
- redelivery rate
- customer-support enquiries
- delivery complaints
- damage rate
- internal administration time
- delivery performance
A slightly lower delivery price may not represent a saving if it creates significantly more work elsewhere.
10. Review Delivery Patterns Regularly
Delivery requirements change as a business grows.
A service that worked when a business processed ten orders a day may not be appropriate at 100 orders a day.
Regularly review:
Where are orders going?
How many deliveries leave each day?
How urgent are they really?
How many could be grouped together?
How many deliveries fail?
How much staff time is spent managing delivery?
These questions can reveal opportunities that aren’t obvious when looking only at individual delivery prices.
Lower Delivery Costs Through Better Operations
Reducing delivery costs isn’t simply about negotiating a cheaper rate.
Often, the bigger opportunity comes from improving how deliveries are organised.
Choosing the appropriate service, consolidating deliveries, optimising routes, improving address accuracy, reducing failed deliveries and automating administration can all contribute to a more efficient operation.
GoPeople offers different delivery models depending on the business requirement:
GoEXPRESS for next-day parcel delivery.
GoBUNDLE for multi-drop delivery.
GoSAMEDAY for same-day delivery.
GoVIP for urgent on-demand courier requirements.
Businesses can also check GoPeople service availability for their pickup location.