To compete in today’s ever-changing retail landscape, sellers must offer quality merchandise, favorable pricing, free, fast shipping and seamless returns. Done well, consumer happiness may fuel loyalty. That’s what we are all working toward.

However, return policies create a costly and growing challenge for retailers, e-tailers and manufacturers. Companies without optimized return management programs forced to sell distressed inventory for pennies on the dollar through liquidation. In both cases, sellers and manufacturers are losing out in two ways; they are failing to be socially responsible and they are leaving money on the table.

Some might call it a reverse logistics nightmare, goTRG calls it an opportunity, a chance to innovate and use technology to solve a problem. In fact, some of the world’s largest companies have already tapped into the company’s solutions.

The Solution: Embrace the Circular Economy Skyrocketing retail returns create a costly burden for today’s retailers, e-tailers and manufacturers. In fact, in 2017, customer returns cost U.S. sellers an estimated $270 billion (not including food, beverage and auto sales). By embracing the Circular Economy with goTRG’s innovative end-to-end SaaS and business solutions for supply chain and omni-channel, sellers maximize recovery on returns and overstock and reduce environmental impact.

In business, concentration is always on the bottom line. But more recently, the focus has been on doing your part to help the environment through social responsibility initiatives, the “double bottom line.”

goTRG is committed to having its technologies be part of the environmental solution. Today, the company is doubling recoveries and reducing carbon footprints significantly for the world’s leading retailers, e-tailers and manufacturers. In 2017, goTRG’s SaaS and supply chain solutions were responsible for reducing customers’ environmental impact by more than 33.06 million pounds of CO2 and stopped over 100 million pounds of product from ending up in landfills.

img2

Minimizing Touches, Maximizing Recovery goTRG’s intelligent disposition technology maximizes recovery and creates less waste. No item gets touched or moved until the company’s SaaS, makes a real time disposition decision using Data science and machine learning to determine where an item should end up, Restock, Return to Vendor, Recycle, Repair, Donate or Liquidate. This avoids unnecessary transport which reduces CO2 emissions and keeps items out of landfills.

Today, many retailers, e-tailers and manufacturers understand; returns have significant value. When customer returns are liquidated, the inventory is sold at far below market value. This solution for reverse and returns takes away a seller’s “what to do with all those returns” burden while adding margin to their bottom line. By embracing the Circular Economy retailers, e-tailers and manufacturers can rest assured they are doing their part for the environment by keeping items out of landfills.

Keeping Inventory Where It Belongs: In the Circle Embracing the Circular Economy is no longer a question of “if,” but when. And, if you want to stay ahead of your competition, the answer is now.

By 2030, the world’s population will hit around 9 billion people. According to GreenBiz, the demand for more and more -- better, faster, cheaper -- products and services will be “unparalleled.” At the same time, the World Bank released data that predicts skyrocketing municipal solid waste, “from 1.3 to 2.2 billion tons per year by 2025,” GreenBiz reported.

An analysis released by McKinsey and Company says companies with a supply chain have no choice but to adopt the circular economic strategy. By definition, the circular economic model, according to the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, “aims to keep products, components and materials at their highest utility and value at all times, distinguishing between technical and biological cycles.”

Adopting the Circular Economy model, according to The Guardian, “could add $1 trillion to the global economy by 2025 and create 100,000 new jobs within the next five years.”

While plenty of companies have recently “discovered” the Circular Economy (even though the concept has been around for many years), Miami-based goTRG embraced it more than a decade ago. The company was founded in 2008 by experts in Supply Chain and Omni-Channel sales who set out to solve the industries’ greatest challenges. This didn’t happen overnight. The company assembled a team of innovative engineers, developers and retailers with decades of experience in e-commerce and Returns Management. They spent over one million hours (and counting!) developing, testing and perfecting innovative solutions. Today, goTRG offers the world’s first end-to-end SaaS and business solution for supply chain and Omni-Channel sales.

The result of so many years of hard work is as incredible as it sounds: this solution allows its customers to make more money while helping save the environment.

The company’s SaaS, uses data collected and curated from over 100 marketplaces, using machine learning and data science the disposition engine predicts the most optimal disposition for every item across the entire supply chain reducing touches and maximizing profitability.

In addition to SaaS, goTRG offers a fully managed turn-key solution. Retailers, e-tailers and manufacturers without the budget to change their supply chain infrastructure can run a pilot without any upfront investment.

Conclusion Industry sources predict consumers’ demand for more goods will skyrocket in the next decade while, at the same time, municipal solid waste is expected to almost double. Retail returns may be inevitable, but it’s incumbent on today’s manufacturers and sellers to do everything possible to reduce their carbon footprint at every step of the supply chain.

Companies can choose reverse logistics solutions powered by intelligent technology, thereby embracing socially responsible, environmentally sustainable practices that are good for the earth. In fact, successful retailers, e-tailers and manufacturers need to look at the entire return management process as a part of the circular economy roadmap, not the end of the road.

---

Sender Shamiss
Sender Shamiss, President/CEO of goTRG (The Recon Group) My friends and family might say that I am too passionate and direct; if they do, definitely no argument from me. During the day I try to change the world of retail, supply chain, SaaS, AI, robotics and automation. I spent my life creating, innovating and implementing supply chain and software solutions, I am an entrepreneur who has the honor of running a company with hundreds of millions of dollars in sales, 6 facilities, 1.1 million sqf, locations in 4 countries and most importantly 1000+ of the world’s most incredible people, that’s my day job. Evenings and weekends are spent doing elementary school math, reading stories and making playdoh doll houses.