Is peak season peak profit? You would think it should be.
Your volume is at its highest all year. If you’re in photobooks or photoprints, you might see volumes triple. If you’re in apparel, it could be up eight to ten times. But during this peak season surge, are your margins at the same level as they are at other times of the year? Or are they being eroded by lower productivity during your second and third shifts, higher fail rates due to machinery issues and less skilled staff, or a less profitable order mix because your average shopping cart value is lower than at other times?
Any one of these factors—or all three—could mean that your profit margins are significantly lower than at other times of the year, and that’s potentially very dangerous for your business.
Without a clear view of what your peak season margins are, you might make suboptimal resourcing decisions, leading to less net cash flow from peak than you expect.
Even worse if you are running your business on averages, working off P&L statements created 1-2 weeks after month end you may have a serious problem emerging and none of the mechanisms to nip the problem in the bud and bleeding serious cash in the process.
One of the major advantages of automation is that, when implemented well, it can track every cost and input, in real time, providing the real story about what’s happening in your business, right down to individual product ranges, product groups, product codes, brands and geography. This way, you know exactly how peak season is impacting your business’s profitability.
In print on demand we are running a product portfolio, a portfolio to be finessed to maximize business profitability, and that demands the ability to manage that portfolio with precision at scale.
