Paul Dodd is Co-Founder and CTO of third-party logistics provider Huboo and has more than 20 years’ experience managing supply chain operations. In this conversation, Dodd explains why all retailers stand to benefit from developing more ethical, transparent supply chains.
BooHoo is a retailer that has recently come under scrutiny for its supply chain practices. What are the main issues you’ve encountered across the retail sector?
Wherever your business sits in the supply chain, if you underpay your staff, treat them poorly and fail to give them any variety in their roles, issues are bound to occur. This is what’s now coming to light across the sector.
It’s been particularly alarming to hear about businesses failing to provide PPE to staff despite the ongoing pandemic, employees being forced to walk 10 miles per day in some of the bigger warehouses, or companies fitting employees with devices to track their every workplace movement.
In fulfilment, one of the biggest issues is the growth of ‘faceless’ warehousing models, with companies attempting to automate everything while disenfranchising their remaining human staff. Increasing automation and removing human intelligence is no recipe for fulfilment success, but sadly this is happening across the industry.
Is it unrealistic to expect smaller retailers to meet the same standards as larger rivals around supply chain transparency and ethics?
Not at all. Transparency is essential whatever your size. 20 years ago it was possible for supply chains to operate largely out of sight and out of mind. That simply isn’t the case today. Consumers are making more ethical choices and demanding the same of the companies they purchase from.
However, we’ve actually found that many smaller retailers are leading the way and pushing us on our ethical credentials – and rightly so. If sole traders are prepared to take the time to ask us about our HR practices, energy usage, and suchlike, there can be no excuse for large retailers failing to do the same across their own supply chains.
How should retailers select their supply chain partners?
It’s about basic governance, as well as asking the right questions at the outset. For example, how much do you pay your warehouse staff? What benefits do they get? What does a typical working day look like?
Retailers should ask to tour the supply chain partner’s facilities and speak to the employees. If the partner refuses, it’s a sign that something is amiss.
As eCommerce continues to grow, surely service expectations will take precedence over staff wellbeing?
Service levels improve when staff are treated properly. Employees are responsible for getting goods out to customers on time, safely and undamaged – the foundation of good service. A workforce that is disengaged, exhausted and underpaid is not going to deliver to these criteria, and it’s the retailer that will most likely suffer the reputational damage as a consequence.
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