If Amazon Ran a TCG Singles Business (Part 1)
One of Amazon's greatest innovations was their novel approach to inventory management in their warehouses. Can we apply similar concepts to level up inventory management for TCG singles?
Traditionally, warehouse inventory management involved organizing every single item based on categories and classifications. This system is easy for humans to follow and makes it simple to find items when fulfilling an order.
Amazon asked a revolutionary question: "What if we had the same ability to find items and fulfill orders easily, without needing to spend the time and effort keeping everything organized?"
Their innovation was chaotic warehousing.
What is Chaotic Warehousing?
The concept of chaotic warehousing is simple - rather than organizing items based on categories and classifications, items are placed wherever is convenient. That might be based on size or when they came into inventory or just wherever there's a free spot!
But how do you find the item when it's time to fulfill an order? The trick is digital inventory software. Items are catalogued as they enter inventory and their location tracked as they move throughout the warehouse. Amazon’s systems would tell warehouse staff the exact location of an item when it came time to pick it out for an order.
The main benefit that Amazon saw were huge savings in the costs of organizing and maintaining inventory. The effort going into organization and maintenance was an enormous labor cost, incurred purely to optimize retrieval. By rethinking their retrieval system, they were able to eliminate a significant portion of those costs. There may have been slight increases in the time taken to pick and fulfill an order, but this was massively outweighed by the savings.
This innovation was made possible by the developments in inventory management software and artificial intelligence. No one would have dreamed of suggesting a system like chaotic warehousing without it, it just wouldn't make sense.
Chaotic Warehousing and TCG Inventory Management
We think a similar dynamic is happening now in the TCG singles market.
The traditional approach has been alphabetization, often combined with separating based on set. This approach makes sense when all you have at your disposal are humans, but it's extremely labour intensive. It's a big cost, both in time and money, incurred purely to optimize retrieval.
Now, times are changing. Dedicated software and automation for TCG singles sellers are abundant and accessible. These tools are opening up new options for inventory management.
So, if Amazon were to start running a TCG singles trade today, how would they approach inventory management? We think they'd be leveraging the power of these tools to revolutionise their processes and maximise efficiency.
Join us for Part 2, where we'll explore in detail what a chaotic warehousing system for TCG inventory management might look like.
