A tale of Ulmart...
Ulmart has decided to go back to good old fashioned post sales. We seriously doubt that customers will be eager to avail themselves of this method of ordering, but – whatever floats their U-boat.
A bunch of issues came up straight away.
Working solely with Russian Post, a state-run shipping company, would be an acceptable option if the state and the country were something else; as it is, this Soviet dinosaur is infamous for its quality of disservice.
And sticking with only one commercial delivery firm is a commitment to limitations: they may not deliver parcels to some places at all, or they may reject some kinds of cargo, lack certain services, charge too much for others and so on.
In short, for the potential customer to have a half-decent range of options for coverage, quality and price, Ulmart had to hook up with a bunch of companies.
Each one had its own terms, problems, pick up points, software interfaces for integrating customers’ ordering systems (if at all), cost calculations etc.
Very messy and dubiously profitable, especially with the post sales concept itself being what it is.
Ulmart’sdedication to selling by post would have been abortive, had they not discoveredthe services of Aplix.ru — an integrator of various delivery services. This company is a middleman connecting online stores, the shippers, with the likes of DHL, Pony Express, EMS, Russian Post, DPD and others.
Ultima Consulting comments:
We are tight-fisted when it comes to dispensing compliments, especially because
they are so rarely deserved (“the oil suits the relic,” as Patriarch Nikon said when sewage flooded Lenin’s mausoleum). But Aplix is a rare pearl in the labyrinth of meaningless portals the 21st century start-up pandemic keeps spawning.
The company provides an API for calculating delivery pricedirectly on the store’s website, which automatically tallies up cost for theoperator of choice and the cargo’s weight and dimensions.
Then Aplix takesorders from Ulmart’s warehouse, packages and labels parcels to the standards ofthe selected delivery company, brings them to that company’s warehouse andworks with it to sort out delivery issues as the tracked package moves to thedestination. Nice!
So bow Ulmart gets a few percent of its turnaround from post sales – which is not so much by Ulmart’s measure by Ulmart’s measure, but very easily done thanks to the guys at Aplix.