The wheels come off

The Daily Mail has written two rather breathlesspieces (does it do any other type?) over the last couple of days about problems at Halfords following its new warehouse going live, and given it’s not the usual retail writer there doing them, it looks like someone’s got a mate on the inside who’s feeding him info on the impact it’s having on deliveries to customers and stores.

There’s clearly something amiss - we’re trying to get to the bottom of it for the magazine as I write - but I’m surprised it’s happenned to Halfords of all retailers, given that it seemed so well prepared for the changeover. Chief executive David Wild spoke at Retail Week’s Supply Chain Summit about the plans earlier this year, and also did a feature with Joanna where it all seemed to make a lot of sense and offer genuine benefits for the business. The extremely likeable Wild made his name as a supply chain expert when he worked with Walmart and Tesco, and I’m sure he’ll make sure it’s put right, although the current problems will be very painful.

Halfords isn’t alone though. In recent years retailers from Waterstones to Mothercare and - most famously - Sainsbury’s have had their plans derailed by over-ambitious revamps of their logistics networks. I’m no expert on warehousing and distribution - and would love to hear the thoughts of people who are - but it seems to me that things seem to go wrong when there’s an over-reliance on technology at the expense of the human touch.

Now technology clearly has a big part to play in the supply chain and when it’s got right can improve accuracy and speed no end. But there remains a role for people - fewer of them for sure - to apply the logic and experience to control the systems and add in the intuition which remains at the heart of a successful logistics operation, even in these high-tech days.

Much of the automation Sainsbury’s installed ended up not being used because humans could do it better, and its experience - which was a key factor of the appalling mess Justin King inherited - is a cautionary tale to all those retailers looking to revamp their supply chains.