It is no less challenging than successfully running an ecommerce business. From handling inventory to fulfilling orders and ensuring timely deliveries, the entire supply chain becomes overwhelming. And, the growth of an e-commerce business is directly tied to how efficiently and effectively you manage key aspects of this supply chain. Here comes kitting and fulfillment—the two strategies that can optimize your operations and boost your bottom line. Kitting involves gathering multiple items into a single package for delivery, while fulfillment involves receiving, processing, and delivering orders. In this article, let’s understand the different roles of kitting and fulfillment in your e-commerce business and how these services can help streamline logistics operations. 

What is Kitting? 

Kitting is the process of assembling individual items into shipping packages or kits under a single SKU (stock-keeping unit). By doing so, kitting saves both time and reduces manual errors throughout order processing. Let’s understand that with an example:

Imagine yourself as a customer buying a complete skincare kit (including moisturizer, serum, sunscreen, toner, and lip balm). Instead of purchasing each item separately, the retailer assembles all these products into a single package and assigns it one SKU. This way, when you place an order for the skincare kit, the warehouse team simply picks the pre-assembled kit rather than gathering individual items. 

This process saves the time of the warehouse, retailer, and customer, streamlining the entire order fulfillment process. Kitting is commonly used in industries like e-commerce, manufacturing, and electronics. 

Are Kitting and Bundling the Same? 

Even though kitting and bundling are used interchangeably, they still have distinct differences. As defined above, kitting assembles multiple items into a separate package under an SKU. On the other hand, bundling is the process of grouping separate SKUs to sell them together. Note: once an order is placed, only then are the items picked and packed together. 

Types of Kitting 

There are different types of kitting. Let’s understand them below:

• Warehouse Kitting: This type involves storing pre-assembled kits as single units and preparing them for shipping and delivery.

• Manufacturing Kitting: Raw materials and components are grouped for production, ensuring all needed items are available for assembly.

• On-Demand Kitting: This type of kitting involves preparing customizable kits as customers demand. Once an order is placed, the items are picked and packed and sent for personalized packaging. 

Benefits of Kitting 

If you implement kitting in your supply chain operations, you can experience significant benefits such as:

• Saving Additional Time & Money: By assembling items into kits, workers reduce the need to pick and pack multiple separate items for each order. This approach speeds up fulfillment and reduces extra time and costs. 

• Better Inventory Management: By using kitting, workers reduce the need to track individual SKUs. Combining multiple products into a single kit simplifies inventory monitoring and restocking, which can lead to better inventory accuracy and reduce the chances of stockouts or restocking. 

• Improved Customer Satisfaction: When customers receive well-curated packages of their orders, they feel more satisfied with their shopping journey as they reduce the need to search and order individual items. 

• Increased Sales: Kitting allows customers to purchase multiple items together, often at a discounted rate, compared to purchasing each item separately. Moreover, well-curated kits can be given as gift options during festival seasons, significantly increasing sales and attracting more customers.

What is Fulfillment? 

Fulfillment involves receiving, processing, and delivering online orders to customers. In this process, a warehouse receives and stores products or raw materials from a specific retailer. Then, the warehouse workers pick and pack customer-generated orders and ship them for final delivery. If you want to run a successful online business, fulfillment is a crucial aspect that can make a difference. 

While fulfillment can be managed in-house, it can lead to additional costs and money as you will require high labour, resources, and equipment to process orders. That’s why most e-commerce business owners trust renowned third-party fulfillment centres for order fulfillment. 

Hiring a 3PL fulfillment company can benefit you in many ways, such as better storage of products and raw materials, improved inventory, accuracy in order processing, and on-time order deliveries. All these benefits directly lead to better customer satisfaction, fulfilled demands (especially during peak season or BFCM), and expanded business growth. 

What Happens When Kitting and Fulfillment Work Together? 

Both kitting and fulfillment processes help reduce supply chain chaos by streamlining inventory management, order fulfillment and deliveries. When kitting is incorporated into the fulfillment process, businesses experience:

• Improved efficiency, productivity, and accuracy

• Reduced human errors and increased accuracy in order processing

• More retained and increased customers, which means a surge in sales

• Improved customer experience, satisfaction, and build loyalty

To Summarize 

Kitting and fulfillment are smart strategies that can transform your e-commerce supply chain operations from basic to streamlined and highly optimized. By collaborating with a reliable and reputable 3PL provider and leveraging their kitting and fulfillment services, businesses can enhance both speed and accuracy while reducing costs and improving customer satisfaction.