Airbnb for logistics providers

Digitalization of warehouse logistics

At the project kick-off, the status quo in warehouse digitization was characterized in form of a single picture: an office full of piles of paper and files, documents, notes, pens, post-its. Somewhere below, a desk and a telephone. Next to it, a full ashtray. The image depicts a logistics office in the 1980s. Forty years later, little has changed.

As a pioneer of contract logistics, Fiege has become acquainted with all facets of the industry since its founding as a transport company to a globally operating full-service logistics provider. Among other things, what it means to avoid vacancies in warehouse operations and, on the other hand, to handle requests for short-term storage capacities.

The idea to develop an on-demand solution for warehousing is a big step away from the dusty image of logistics towards the digitalization of business needs, which pose major challenges not only for warehouse logisticians but also for shippers.

Rapid MVP

The idea for the platform that had been developed within the company was to be implemented as an MVP for a product launch. At the same time, only three weeks were available from kick-off to the first release. The extremely short project duration can be seen as both a curse and a blessing. Extensive research is not possible, decisions - even irreversible ones - have to be made immediately and the scope for nice-to-have features is vanishingly small. On the other hand, the situation sharpens the focus on the essential features of a solution. The functional scope and the level of detail of the elaboration are strictly oriented to the time available.

When and how much

Four essential elements were defined that should become part of the MVP: Landing page with search input, search results page, detailed information about a stock, and the execution of a request.

Also considering already existing approaches on the American market, the most important factors for a successful placement were identified as time period and quantity. Especially in a geographically small market like Germany, the distance to the warehouse plays a less important role than for example in the USA.

Furthermore, to reduce complexity, only the search for pallet spaces was initially considered, although a specification of other sizes such as cartons is conceivable.

UX-Design

Regardless of the project scope, UX design is indispensable for us. We used the client's in-depth expertise and two previously outlined customer journeys as a basis for our work.

Measure twice, cut once

Following this craftsman's wisdom, we transferred the information available to us into user flows, which were also intended to narrow down the scope of functions immediately after the start of the project. In this way, we were able to achieve an initial work result without spending a lot of time, pick up the project participants at the content level and set the course for the further design process.

The next deliverable, at least as necessary for us, was wireframes of the four core pages. While somewhat more time-consuming to create, the schematic drawings serve to give us a very accurate picture of the finished product, where design is not yet important, but only the scope of content is relevant.

All essential questions and comments could be clarified in this ramp-up phase, so that we could then begin with the realization of the user interface as well as the technical implementation at the same time. This underlines the value of such a toolset in digital product development.

Interface Design

Despite the tight time frame, we developed a simple design concept that worked flawlessly from a usability perspective. Here, it was important both to prepare complex content in a structured manner and to consider and ensure the expansion of the application after the MVP phase.

Backend/Frontend

In the first expansion stage, administrative access by external warehouse logistics experts was to be ignored. Thus, based on our in-house web application framework, we were able to provide an executable system in a very short time, which allows to create all information about warehouses and their services and detailed information as well as the corresponding availabilities. Subsequently, the business logic had to be implemented, which delivers the appropriate results from the request of the period and the warehouse space.

At the same time, the user interface was implemented and connected to the back-end services. Various issues also had to be ignored for the frontend implementation in the first expansion stage. For example, optimization for display on mobile devices was deliberately omitted. Support for older browsers was also not the focus of the initial implementation.

Go-live

After three weeks of intensive work, the first version of the MVP could be released to be tested extensively. With the beginning of the Covid-19 crisis, we then adapted the application to the changed requirements with a comprehensive update. Under the slogan #wekeepitrunning, Flexfillment is designed to help secure supply chains during the crisis. The portal offers free of charge the possibility to find buffer capacities and to offer such capacities. In particular, companies with storage bottlenecks for critical goods or warehouse logisticians who have free capacities due to production stops are to be brought together in an uncomplicated way.

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