Hybrid buildings for branch supply and e-commerce
- Hybrid logistics
- Hybridlogistik
Omni-channel retailing is currently one of the hottest topics in commerce. The merging of the individual sales channels also affects the layout and design of logistics buildings. Simple logistic halls become modern hybrid Buildings.
At the Garbe Industrial Real Estate Park Westfalenhütte in Dortmund, progress is being made on a real future issue that project developers in the company have been working on for a long time: The coalescence of brick-and-mortar and e-commerce logistics in a single building designed for the task. This development can be regarded as a milestone. Because of their own lack of know-how, the first businesses to provide successful web shops, such as well-known fashion companies, were reliant on complete packages from specialised logistics and fulfilment service providers. In addition to web shop software, these package deals also included product photography, call centres, payment processing, etc., and all logistical services including returns processing. These service providers centralised their service provision in their own logistics centres. This worked rather well for many years. Today, however, the formerly separate sales channels are merging: For example, end customers expect to be able to return by post a product they purchased in the store, or to return goods they ordered online in the store – the coexistence of offline and online commerce has become no-line commerce. This development requires that the different logistical processes also merge.
ONLINE AND OFFLINE BECOME NO-LINE: ALL LOGISTICS IN ONE LOCATION, ONE BUILDING!Jan Dietrich Hempel, Member of the Garbe Industrial Real Estate GmbH Management Board
GARBE PROPERTIES IN DEVELOPMENT
Two Westfalenhütte projects are setting the trend here. Another building with 32,000 m2 of logistics, functional and workshop space is currently being built for the brand manufacturer Decathlon to supply it branch and e-commerce logistics, including returns processing. The facility is equipped with sophisticated sorting technology.
In addition, the tenant ID Logistics took over a section of 30,000 m2 of logistics space in February 2016 in order to provide web-logistics services for IKEA.
Both buildings show a clear, but not radical, difference in comparison to familiar standard logistic hall layouts in terms of the ratio of hall space to social Areas.
THE FUTURE IS IN SIGHT
This new property type is suitable for a future logistics model without losing any attractiveness in terms of future leases. Such hybrid buildings are attractive for logistics investments, especially since the size and the characteristics of the building are not great in comparison, for example, to huge buildings like Amazon’s Pure Player.