Author name: Ewan Reid

Can Your 3PL Do This? Connecting Customer Service AI Directly to Fulfilment Data

3PL, Move Fresh News, Quality, Technology / By

Most businesses looking at AI for customer service quickly run into the same problem. The AI might be perfectly capable of having a sensible conversation with a customer, but unless it has access to the systems containing the answer, it can only do so much.

Delivery queries are a good example. A customer asks, “Where is my order?”, and traditionally somebody in customer service has to identify the order, open a warehouse or courier system, check what has happened and then translate that information back into a useful response. It is a straightforward task, but when you multiply it across hundreds or thousands of orders it consumes a surprising amount of customer-service resource.

We thought there should be a better way of doing it, particularly as more of our clients start experimenting with AI-based customer service.

So we have built one.

Giving AI Access to the Answer, Not Just the Conversation

Move Fresh has developed a service that allows an AI customer-service application to query fulfilment and delivery information directly from our systems. Instead of the AI telling a customer that somebody will check their order, it can check the order itself and provide the answer during the conversation.

The connection uses Model Context Protocol, usually shortened to MCP. There is plenty of technical detail behind MCP, but from a brand’s perspective the useful part is relatively simple: it provides a standard way for AI applications to connect securely to external systems and use the information held within them.

In our case, that means a client’s AI can ask Move Fresh for the current position of an order and receive the information it needs to answer the customer. The service can report where an order is within the fulfilment process, provide expected delivery information and, once the parcel is moving, use available courier tracking information to give a more current estimate.

That changes the role of AI considerably. Rather than being a chatbot sitting in front of a knowledge base and answering generic questions, it becomes capable of resolving a genuine customer enquiry using live operational data.

“Where Is My Order?” Is More Complicated Than It Looks

Anyone who has worked in ecommerce customer service will know that a delivery query is rarely as simple as reading out a tracking status.

An order that has been travelling for three days might be perfectly on schedule if it was sent on a five-day service, while a next-day order in exactly the same position clearly needs attention. An order might still be going through the warehouse, it might have been packed but not collected, or the courier may already have provided a more precise delivery window.

For an AI service to be useful, it needs enough context to understand those distinctions rather than simply finding a status and repeating it.

That was an important part of how we approached the Move Fresh service. Once an order has been dispatched, the system retains the delivery deadline that applied when it left us and can compare this with the latest expected delivery information. This allows an AI assistant to distinguish between an order that is genuinely late and one that is simply taking the expected amount of time for the service selected.

It sounds like a small detail, but it matters. A customer does not need an apology and escalation because their five-day delivery is still moving normally on day three. Equally, somebody waiting several days for a next-day shipment deserves more than a generic message saying that the parcel is “in transit”.

Good customer service depends on understanding the difference.

Freeing People to Deal With the Queries That Actually Need People

We do not see this as AI replacing customer-service teams. The more useful opportunity is removing a significant volume of routine administration from them.

Checking the status of an order is necessary work, but it is rarely where an experienced customer-service person adds the most value. Their time is better spent resolving genuinely difficult issues, helping vulnerable customers, dealing with damaged or missing orders, arranging replacements or handling the situations where judgement and empathy actually matter.

If an AI assistant can resolve straightforward delivery queries immediately, at any time of day, the customer gets a quicker answer and the service team gets more capacity to deal properly with the exceptions.

There is another benefit for D2C brands because customer enquiries do not necessarily arrive conveniently between nine and five. Someone wondering where their food order is at 8pm should not have to wait until the following morning simply because finding the answer requires a person to log into another system. If the information is available, there is no particularly good reason why the customer should not be able to access it.

Keeping AI Access Controlled

Giving an AI service access to operational data obviously raises questions about security, so we designed the connection around a deliberately narrow set of capabilities.

Access is read-only and restricted to the individual brand’s orders. The service can look up fulfilment and delivery information, but it cannot create an order, amend one, cancel it, place it on hold or issue a refund. Personally identifying customer information is not exposed through the service.

Each client controls access using its own secure authentication and can disable or replace its access credentials if required.

That distinction between allowing an AI to read information and allowing it to take operational actions is important. There will undoubtedly be more opportunities for AI agents to carry out actions in ecommerce over time, but for delivery enquiries we think the sensible starting point is giving them accurate information while keeping control of operational changes elsewhere.

Why This Matters for D2C Brands

There has been a lot written about what AI might eventually do for ecommerce, but we are more interested in finding practical things it can do now.

For a growing D2C food, drink or health brand, delivery enquiries are a good example because they sit at the intersection of customer experience and operational cost. As order volume grows, the number of routine enquiries tends to grow with it, which traditionally means adding customer-service resource or accepting slower response times during busy periods.

Connecting customer-service AI directly to fulfilment information gives brands another option. Routine enquiries can be resolved automatically, customers get access to current information more quickly, and the brand’s own team can concentrate on cases that genuinely require intervention.

It also demonstrates something broader about the relationship between a brand and its 3PL. A modern fulfilment partner should not operate as a closed warehouse where information has to be retrieved manually every time somebody needs it. The warehouse should be connected to the rest of the brand’s technology, whether that is its ecommerce platform, reporting environment, marketplace software or increasingly its AI tools.

We have invested in our own development capability at Move Fresh for exactly that reason. We want the fulfilment operation to become an extension of the systems our clients already use, rather than another piece of technology their teams have to work around.

The Next Step in Connected Fulfilment

AI customer service will develop quickly over the next few years and we certainly do not pretend to know exactly where it will end up. What seems much clearer is that the useful applications will depend on access to reliable, structured data.

An AI assistant without operational information can have a very convincing conversation while still being unable to answer the customer’s question. Connect it securely to the right information and it becomes considerably more useful.

Our new AI customer-service integration is a relatively simple example of that principle, but we think it points towards where fulfilment technology is heading. The opportunity is not to add AI terminology to an existing warehouse operation; it is to make fulfilment data genuinely accessible to the tools brands want to use.

For us, that starts with one of the most common questions in ecommerce: “Where is my order?”

If your customer-service team is still manually checking fulfilment and delivery systems every time that question arrives, there is now another way of doing it.

Want to See How It Works?

Move Fresh clients can connect compatible AI customer-service applications directly to our fulfilment data using our new MCP service, with secure, read-only access restricted to their own orders.

If you are a D2C food, drink or health brand shipping more than 100 orders a day and would like to understand how this could work alongside your existing customer-service operation, talk to us.

Find out more about Move Fresh AI Customer Service or speak to our team about connecting your customer-service AI directly to fulfilment data.

https://movefresh.com/technology/ai-customer-service/

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The Hidden Cost of Holding Too Much Stock Before Peak

3PL, Move Fresh News, Quality, Technology / By

September is usually the point when D2C brands start getting serious about peak. Forecasts are being firmed up, promotional calendars are taking shape and purchasing teams are trying to make sure there is enough stock in the building or supply chain to cope with Black Friday and Christmas. The natural response is often to buy a little more than the forecast suggests, because running out of your best seller in November feels like a much bigger risk than carrying a few extra pallets into January.

There is some logic to that, but after years of working in food and drink operations we have also seen the other side of it. Excess stock has a cost well beyond the cash tied up in the product itself, and for brands with shelf-life constraints, changing product ranges or expensive packaging, those costs can build surprisingly quickly.

The objective before peak should not simply be to get as much stock as possible into the warehouse. It should be to have the right stock, arriving at the right time, with enough confidence in your forecast and inventory data that you do not need to use excess stock as an insurance policy.

More Stock Does Not Necessarily Mean Less Risk

It is easy to look at stockholding as a straightforward trade-off between availability and working capital. Buy more and you reduce the risk of running out; buy less and you preserve cash but risk losing sales. In practice, it is rarely that simple.

If a brand is carrying £500,000 of inventory rather than the £400,000 it genuinely needs, there is £100,000 of cash sitting on warehouse shelves. That might be entirely justified if the additional stock is going to sell through quickly, but if it has been purchased because forecasts are uncertain or because nobody quite trusts the existing inventory position, the business is solving an operational problem with working capital.

There are also physical consequences. Extra pallets consume storage space at exactly the point in the year when warehouses need the greatest flexibility. Goods-in volumes increase, replenishment becomes busier and slower-moving products can start competing for locations with the lines that are actually driving peak sales. A warehouse with every available location full may look reassuring from a stock perspective, but operationally it can be much harder to run than one carrying a more disciplined inventory position.

For food, drink and health brands there is an additional consideration because inventory has a clock attached to it. Excess stock that would merely be inconvenient in another ecommerce category can become a genuine write-off if shelf life becomes too short for sale, a product formulation changes or packaging is updated before the stock has cleared.

Peak Buying Should Start with Better Information

The strongest peak plans we see are not necessarily the ones with the most detailed spreadsheets. They are the ones where commercial, purchasing and operations teams are working from the same information and have a shared view of what is likely to happen.

That means understanding current stock accurately, knowing what is already on order, reviewing recent sales rather than simply repeating last year’s purchasing plan, and separating genuine demand from promotional assumptions that may or may not materialise. If a major November campaign is expected to generate a significant uplift, there should be a clear understanding of which SKUs are likely to benefit and when that demand will hit the warehouse.

Inventory accuracy matters enormously here. If the starting stock position cannot be trusted, every forecast built on top of it contains another layer of uncertainty. Purchasing teams naturally respond by adding contingency, and the result is often a business holding more stock than it needs simply because nobody is sufficiently confident in the underlying data.

The same principle applies to packaging. Peak planning often concentrates on finished goods while boxes, inserts, protective materials and seasonal packaging are dealt with later. A shortage of the correct carton can stop an order leaving the warehouse just as effectively as a shortage of the product itself, while buying months of bespoke packaging in advance creates another pool of working capital that may eventually become obsolete.

This is one of the reasons we increasingly see value in managed packaging. Rather than brands purchasing large quantities and finding somewhere to store them, packaging can be specified, sourced and managed alongside the fulfilment operation, with stock levels aligned more closely to actual usage.

Food and Drink Brands Need to Think About What Happens After December

One of the easiest mistakes to make during peak planning is to focus entirely on getting through November and December. The more difficult question is what the warehouse and balance sheet will look like in January.

If peak underperforms against forecast, where does the excess inventory go? How much shelf life remains? Can promotional stock be sold through normal channels, or was it produced specifically for Christmas? Does seasonal packaging still have a use? Are January purchase orders already committed before the business knows what December has actually sold?

These questions are particularly important for growing brands because cash is usually more valuable than warehouse stock. Money tied up in six months of inventory cannot be used for marketing, product development, recruitment or the next production run. There will always be a sensible level of safety stock, but there is a difference between deliberately holding additional inventory against a known risk and simply buying more because forecasting and stock control are not giving the business enough confidence.

A good 3PL should be part of that conversation. Fulfilment providers see the physical stock position, the rate at which products are actually leaving the warehouse and the operational impact of changing demand. Sharing that information properly with the brand gives purchasing and commercial teams another useful input into peak planning rather than leaving the warehouse to deal with whatever eventually arrives.

The Aim Is Confidence, Not Maximum Stock

Nobody wants to be the person who explains in December that a best seller has gone out of stock, so it is understandable that peak planning tends to err on the side of caution. The answer, though, is not simply to fill the warehouse.

The better approach is to build enough confidence in your inventory, forecasts, inbound planning and packaging supply that contingency can be deliberate rather than arbitrary. That means knowing where the genuine risks sit and carrying additional stock where there is a commercial reason to do so, rather than applying another percentage across the entire range because it feels safer.

At Move Fresh we work with D2C food, drink and health brands where stock control, shelf life, traceability, packaging and seasonal demand all need to be managed together. Our role is not simply to store what arrives and ship what sells; it is to give brands better visibility of the operation so they can make more informed decisions about what they need to hold in the first place.

Planning for Peak?

If you are heading into Q4 carrying significantly more inventory than normal, it is worth asking whether every additional pallet is there because you expect to sell it, or because the business is compensating for uncertainty elsewhere.

For brands shipping more than 100 orders a day, a specialist fulfilment partner should be able to help with much more than pick and pack, including inventory visibility, inbound planning, managed packaging and the operational preparation needed to get through peak without creating a January problem.

If you are reviewing your peak fulfilment plans, talk to the Move Fresh team about how we can support your operation through Q4 and beyond.

 

https://movefresh.com/contact/

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Why Inventory Accuracy Is the KPI Every Growing D2C Brand Should Obsess Over

3PL, Move Fresh News, Quality, Technology / By

Spend enough time around growing food businesses and you’ll notice an interesting pattern. The companies that look the calmest on the surface usually aren’t the ones with the biggest warehouse, the most sophisticated automation or even the fastest growth. They’re the businesses where people trust the information they’re working from. The buyer knows what’s in stock before placing the next purchase order, the marketing team launches a campaign knowing the product is genuinely available, and customer services doesn’t spend half the day explaining why an item shown as “in stock” yesterday has suddenly disappeared. That confidence doesn’t happen by accident. It comes from an operation where inventory accuracy has been treated as a commercial priority rather than something that only matters to the warehouse team.

It’s easy to underestimate the importance of that distinction. Inventory accuracy sounds like an operational KPI, the sort of thing discussed in warehouse meetings rather than board meetings. In reality, it influences almost every important decision a growing D2C business makes. If you don’t trust your stock figures, purchasing becomes more cautious, working capital creeps upwards because extra inventory feels like the safest option, and every major promotion carries an element of risk because nobody is entirely sure whether there is enough product to fulfil demand.

The Cost of Uncertainty Is Higher Than Most Brands Realise

One of the most expensive phrases in any growing business is, “I think we’ve got enough stock.”

That single word, “think”, tells you everything you need to know. It means somebody is making a commercial decision without complete confidence in the data sitting in front of them. Sometimes they’re right. Sometimes they’re not. Either way, the business starts building processes around uncertainty rather than facts.

We’ve seen businesses carry months of additional stock simply because nobody fully trusted the inventory records. On paper it looked sensible. In practice it tied up cash unnecessarily, reduced warehouse efficiency and made forecasting harder because the stock position became increasingly blurred. At the other end of the scale, we’ve seen successful marketing campaigns cut short because products that appeared to be available simply weren’t where the system said they should be.

Neither of those problems starts with inventory. They start with confidence. Once confidence in your stock data begins to erode, every department starts compensating in its own way. Purchasing buys earlier than necessary. Customer service becomes cautious about promising availability. Finance questions stock valuations. Marketing starts checking with operations before every campaign. None of these are the root cause, they’re simply the symptoms of an operation that no longer trusts its own information.

Food and Drink Adds Another Layer of Complexity

For food and drink brands, inventory management is rarely just about quantity. Every pallet arriving at the warehouse brings information that needs to be managed alongside the product itself. Batch numbers, expiry dates, supplier details, quality status and traceability all become part of the operational picture. Two pallets may contain exactly the same product, but if one expires six months before the other they cannot be treated as interchangeable.

That is why food fulfilment is fundamentally different from general ecommerce fulfilment. A warehouse management system designed for clothing or consumer electronics can tell you how many units are on the shelf. A food operation also needs to know which stock should be picked first, which batches have been allocated to orders, what remains under quality hold and, if the worst happens, exactly where every affected unit has been sent.

At Move Fresh, those controls aren’t separate modules that are switched on for food customers. Our warehouse management system has been developed specifically around food and drink operations, with inbound shelf-life checks, FIFO management and full traceability forming part of the everyday process. Combined with our BRCGS-certified storage and distribution operation, that gives brands the confidence that inventory isn’t simply being counted, it’s being managed properly throughout its lifecycle.

Good Inventory Control Creates Better Commercial Decisions

People often ask what the return on investment is from improving inventory accuracy. It’s a fair question, but it misses the bigger picture because the value isn’t confined to the warehouse.

When a business genuinely trusts its inventory, better decisions start happening almost everywhere. New products can be launched without worrying whether warehouse processes will cope. Additional sales channels such as Amazon or TikTok Shop can be introduced without ring-fencing stock or manually updating quantities throughout the day. Purchasing decisions become more precise because buyers are working from reliable data rather than estimates, while finance gains greater confidence in stock values and working capital requirements.

Perhaps the biggest benefit, though, is that management conversations become more productive. Instead of debating whether the numbers are correct, teams spend their time discussing what to do with the information. That sounds like a subtle difference, but it’s one of the clearest indicators that an operation is maturing.

Building an Operation That Can Scale

One of the realities of running a successful D2C brand is that operational complexity increases much faster than order volumes. A business shipping fifty orders a day might have a handful of suppliers and a relatively simple product range. At five hundred orders a day, the picture usually looks very different. New product launches, promotional bundles, subscription products, multiple sales channels and seasonal peaks all introduce additional stock movements, and every one of those movements needs to be recorded accurately if the business is going to retain confidence in its inventory.

That’s why inventory accuracy shouldn’t be viewed as a warehouse KPI to review at the end of each month. It is one of the foundations on which profitable growth is built. Businesses that invest early in robust processes, disciplined stock management and systems designed for food operations generally find it much easier to scale because they aren’t constantly second-guessing the information they’re using to make decisions.

Is It Time to Review Your Fulfilment Operation?

If you’re shipping more than 100 orders a day and your team regularly finds itself checking stock before making commercial decisions, there’s a good chance you’ve already outgrown your current processes.

At Move Fresh, we work exclusively with food, drink and health brands, combining specialist warehouse technology with BRCGS-certified operations and food-specific inventory controls to give growing businesses confidence in the numbers they’re working from every day.

Inventory accuracy won’t appear in your customers’ reviews, but they’ll certainly notice the benefits. Orders are fulfilled consistently, products remain available when they’re expected to be, and your business spends less time reacting to operational issues and more time focusing on growth.

If that sounds like the direction you want your operation to take, we’d be delighted to show you how we approach inventory management and where it could make a difference to your business.

Book a no-obligation fulfilment review with the Move Fresh team and discover how specialist food fulfilment can support your next stage of growth.

👉 click here.

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BRCGS Certification Success

3PL, Move Fresh News, Quality / By

Just completed our two-day BRCGS Storage and Distribution audit and I’m delighted to say we’ve retained our AA certification, subject to final confirmation.

A huge well done to everyone involved, and a special mention to Alistair Bottomley, our Environment & Quality Manager, for leading the audit.

BRCGS isn’t about performing well over two days. It’s about maintaining the right standards, processes and culture every single day. That takes commitment from the whole team, and this result reflects the effort that goes into our operation throughout the year.

A result everyone at Move Fresh can be proud of.

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How to Choose a 3PL for Your Food or Drink Brand

3PL, Move Fresh News, Quality, Technology / By

Outsourcing fulfilment is one of the biggest operational decisions a growing food or drink brand will make.

Choose the right 3PL and you’ll gain capacity, improve customer experience and free up your team to focus on growth.

Choose the wrong one and you’ll spend your time chasing missing stock, fixing order errors and apologising to customers.

So how do you separate the right fulfilment partner from the dozens of providers all claiming to offer “fast, reliable fulfilment”?

Here are eight questions every food and drink brand should ask before signing a contract.

1. Do They Actually Understand Food and Drink?

This might sound obvious, but many fulfilment providers are generalists.

Food and drink products bring unique operational challenges, including:

  • Shelf-life management
  • Batch traceability
  • FIFO stock rotation
  • Product recalls
  • Food safety compliance

Ask whether these processes are built into their operation or bolted on afterwards.

At Move Fresh, our warehouse management system has been developed specifically around food and drink logistics, with built-in traceability, shelf-life controls and FIFO management. We also operate under BRCGS Storage and Distribution certification with dedicated quality and HACCP teams.

2. Can Their Technology Grow With You?

Your warehouse should be connected to your business, not operating separately from it. A modern 3PL should integrate with your ecommerce technology, including:

  • Shopify
  • WooCommerce
  • Amazon
  • TikTok Shop
  • Marketplace software
  • ERP systems
  • Customer service platforms

The fewer manual processes involved, the fewer opportunities there are for mistakes. Ask to see how orders flow from your website into the warehouse, if you see lots of paper and spreadsheets then run a mile!

3. How Accurate Is Their Inventory?

Inventory accuracy is the foundation of good fulfilment. Without it, everything else starts to fail. Ask potential partners:

  • How often is stock counted?
  • What inventory accuracy do you achieve?
  • How do you investigate discrepancies?
  • Can customers see live stock levels?

Real-time inventory visibility allows brands to make better purchasing decisions and prevents overselling.

4. Can They Support Your Brand Experience?

Your fulfilment partner is often the last business to touch your product before your customer does. Ask whether they can support:

  • Branded packaging
  • Personalised messages
  • Gift wrapping
  • Promotional inserts
  • Subscription boxes
  • Kitting and bundling

These value-added services help create memorable customer experiences while generating additional revenue opportunities. Move Fresh supports personalisation, gifting, kitting and custom delivery documentation as part of its fulfilment operation .

5. How Will They Handle Growth?

The best time to think about scaling is before you need it. Ask questions like:

  • What happens if our order volumes double?
  • How do you manage seasonal peaks?
  • Can you onboard new product ranges quickly?
  • Do you have room to expand?

Your fulfilment partner should remove operational barriers to growth, not become one.

6. What Does Onboarding Look Like?

A successful transition is about far more than moving pallets. Good onboarding should include:

  • Dedicated project management
  • Systems integration
  • Packaging specification
  • Warehouse process testing
  • Staff training
  • Go-live support
  • Regular review meetings

Move Fresh assigns a cross-functional onboarding team that manages integrations, packaging specifications, training and ongoing continuous improvement. Ask for examples of previous migrations and how they managed them. Even better ask for customer references.

7. Is Pricing Transparent?

Cheapest rarely means best value. Look beyond storage and pick fees. Ask about:

  • Receiving charges
  • Packaging costs
  • Account management
  • Returns processing
  • Technology fees
  • Minimum monthly charges
  • Peak surcharges

Understanding the full cost avoids unpleasant surprises later.

8. Will They Feel Like Part of Your Team?

This is often the biggest differentiator and a great 3PL doesn’t simply process orders they:

  • Solve problems proactively
  • Suggest improvements
  • Share operational insights
  • Help prepare for peak trading
  • Invest in long-term relationships

Finding a 3PL partner with real food & drink expertise alongside packaging development and great tech is key to unlocking this.

Your fulfilment partner should feel like an extension of your business. After all, your customers won’t know where your warehouse ends and your brand begins.

The Questions You Should Ask Every Potential 3PL

Before making your decision, ask:

  • Do you specialise in food and drink?
  • Are you BRCGS certified?
  • How do you manage traceability and expiry dates?
  • Which ecommerce platforms do you integrate with?
  • Can you support marketplace selling?
  • How do you manage personalisation and gifting?
  • What inventory accuracy do you achieve?
  • What does onboarding involve?
  • How do you support brands during peak periods?
  • Can you provide customer references?

If a provider struggles to answer these questions clearly, keep looking.

Choosing a Partner, Not Just a Warehouse

Your fulfilment provider will become one of the most important partners in your business. The right choice gives you confidence to launch new products, enter new sales channels and grow without constantly worrying about operations.

The wrong choice can slow your growth and damage your customer experience.

At Move Fresh, we’ve built our business specifically around the needs of ambitious food, drink and health brands. From BRCGS-certified operations and specialist food warehouse management to marketplace integrations, managed packaging and personalisation, our goal is simple: to become an extension of your team, not just another supplier .

If you’re reviewing your fulfilment operation or considering outsourcing for the first time, we’d be happy to show you what good looks like.

Book a no-obligation fulfilment review with the Move Fresh team today.

👉 https://movefresh.com/contact/

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Marketplace Opportunity for D2C Brands

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Why Smart D2C Brands Are Using Marketplace Software to Unlock Multi-Channel Growth

Selling through your own website is no longer enough. Today’s consumers discover and buy products across multiple channels. They might first find your brand on Amazon, place a repeat order through your Shopify store, and later subscribe via a specialist marketplace.

For ambitious food, drink and health brands, this creates a significant growth opportunity. It also creates operational complexity.

The brands winning in 2026 are not choosing between direct-to-consumer and marketplaces. They are building a strategy that combines both.

The Rise of Multi-Channel Commerce

Ten years ago, many brands viewed marketplaces as competitors to their own websites. Today, the conversation is different. Brands are using marketplaces to:

  • Reach new customer audiences

  • Build brand awareness

  • Generate product trial

  • Support international expansion

  • Create additional revenue streams

Alongside their own ecommerce stores, many brands now sell through:

  • Amazon

  • TikTok Shop

  • eBay

  • Not On The High Street

  • Wholesale and retail portals

  • Subscription platforms

Each channel attracts different customer behaviours and buying habits. The challenge is managing them effectively.

The Hidden Problem: Inventory Fragmentation

The biggest obstacle to multi-channel growth is usually stock management. Many growing brands end up operating separate systems for different sales channels.

The result?

  • Overselling stock

  • Delayed fulfilment

  • Manual inventory updates

  • Increased customer service issues

  • Reduced forecasting accuracy

As sales volumes increase, these problems become more frequent and more expensive. For food and drink brands, the consequences can be even greater because shelf-life, batch control and traceability requirements add another layer of complexity.

What Marketplace Software Actually Does

Modern marketplace software acts as a central control tower for your sales channels. Instead of managing inventory separately across multiple platforms, the software synchronises:

  • Product listings

  • Stock levels

  • Orders

  • Pricing

  • Customer information

Every sale updates inventory across connected channels in real time. This creates a single version of the truth.

Why This Matters for Food and Drink Brands

Food, drink and health products bring unique operational requirements. Brands need visibility of:

  • Shelf-life

  • Batch numbers

  • Inventory ageing

  • Stock availability

  • Product performance by channel

When marketplace software is connected directly to a specialist fulfilment operation, stock movements become visible across the entire supply chain.

At Move Fresh, our warehouse management system is designed around food and drink operations, including traceability, inbound shelf-life controls and FIFO management .

This gives brands confidence that inventory data remains accurate regardless of where customers place orders.

The Opportunity: One Stock Pool, Multiple Revenue Streams

One of the biggest advantages of marketplace software is the ability to operate from a single inventory pool. Instead of allocating separate stock to different channels, brands can:

  • Hold inventory centrally

  • Sell across multiple marketplaces

  • Reduce stock holding requirements

  • Improve stock turn

  • Increase product availability

This creates a more efficient use of working capital while reducing the risk of dead stock. For many brands, this becomes a significant competitive advantage.

Better Data Leads to Better Decisions

Multi-channel selling generates valuable customer and product insights. With the right systems in place, brands can identify:

  • Which channels drive the highest lifetime value

  • Which products perform best on each platform

  • Seasonal demand trends

  • Opportunities for bundling and subscriptions

  • Emerging customer segments

These insights help shape future marketing, product development and inventory planning decisions.

Marketplace Growth Without Operational Chaos

The biggest mistake brands make is expanding sales channels before building the operational infrastructure to support them. Growth should not mean:

  • More spreadsheets

  • More manual processes

  • More stock discrepancies

Instead, growth should come from connecting systems properly. Move Fresh integrates directly with ecommerce platforms and wider technology stacks through APIs and specialist integrations, creating a seamless connection between sales channels and warehouse operations .

This allows brands to expand their route to market without creating fulfilment bottlenecks.

The Future Is Omnichannel

Customers do not think in channels. They simply buy where it is most convenient.

The brands that thrive over the next decade will be those that meet customers wherever they choose to shop while maintaining a consistent brand experience behind the scenes.

Marketplace software makes that possible. Combined with the right fulfilment infrastructure, it allows food, drink and health brands to scale revenue, improve inventory efficiency and create a more resilient business model.

Ready to Connect Your Channels?

If you’re currently managing Shopify, Amazon, TikTok Shop or other marketplaces separately, there may be a simpler way.

Move Fresh helps growing D2C food, drink and health brands connect their sales channels, inventory and fulfilment operations into one scalable ecosystem.

Talk to our team about building a multi-channel fulfilment strategy that supports your next stage of growth.

👉 https://movefresh.com/contact/

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The D2C Shifts Worth Watching – April Roundup

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Market Demand

Demand is still there, but the mood has shifted. UK online retail remains resilient, and non-store retail is still growing, but shoppers are behaving more cautiously and more deliberately than they were even a few months ago. ONS said online sales values rose 2.4% month on month and 10.5% year on year in March, while the share of retail spend online moved up to 28.7%.[1] For D2C brands, that means the channel is healthy, but conversion is being earned through clearer value, tighter offers, and better delivery propositions rather than broad consumer confidence.

That same pattern showed up more clearly in grocery-adjacent behaviour during April. Worldpanel by Numerator reported take-home grocery sales up 0.9% in the four weeks to 19 April 2026, with promoted spend up 7.8% year on year and promotions now accounting for 31.3% of grocery spending.[2] In plain terms: customers are still buying, but they are actively hunting for reassurance. That usually benefits brands with strong hero SKUs, obvious product benefits, and a disciplined promotional plan. It is less forgiving for brands relying on full-price impulse or unclear differentiation.

Cost Pressures

Cost pressure has not gone away either. ONS said food and non-alcoholic beverage inflation rose to 3.7% in the 12 months to March 2026, up from 3.3% in February, while fuel was a major driver of broader inflation pressure.[3] That matters operationally because it tends to work through both shopper sensitivity and fulfilment cost over the following weeks. I would treat May as a margin-control month, not a volume-chasing month.

Carrier cost pressure also widened this month, and it is no longer just a Royal Mail story. Royal Mail’s new pricing took effect on 7 April 2026 across domestic parcel contract products, international account products, and surcharges.[4] Its business parcel surcharge page still shows an 11% fuel and energy surcharge on key parcel services and 8% for Parcelforce Worldwide services.[5] Outside Royal Mail, the tone is similar: DHL Express’s UK 4.9% annual price increase has been in force since 1 January 2026,[6] UPS introduced a new surge fee from 8 March 2026 on selected lanes plus a pre-release notification fee from 12 April 2026 for certain customs-clearance issues,[7] and FedEx applied a temporary increase to its domestic Additional Handling Surcharge from £12.95 to £13.95 per parcel effective 23 March to 8 May 2026.[8] Evri is still presenting itself as the lower-cost value option in market-facing pricing, rather than signalling a notable April public tariff step-up.[9] The practical read-across is that shipping inflation is now broad-based enough to assume continued pressure across most carrier mixes, even where changes are landing through surcharges and handling fees rather than base-rate headlines.

Channel-wise, there is also a steady structural signal worth keeping in view. Amazon continues to push further into UK online grocery, framing Britain as a highly developed online grocery market and expanding its store and partnership footprint.[10] For most food, drink, and health brands, that does not mean “sell on Amazon at all costs.” It means consumer expectations around convenience, availability, and repeat-order ease are continuing to rise. Brands that make replenishment clunky or delivery value hard to understand are likely to feel that pressure first.

Brand and Product Claims

For supplement and wellness brands, claims risk remains very real. MHRA published its latest advertising investigations on 10 April 2026,[11] and the ASA’s recent supplements guidance again makes clear that unauthorised health claims, exaggerated benefits, and medicinal-style claims remain red-flag territory.[12] That does not just affect compliance. It affects paid acquisition efficiency too, because the brands under pressure are often the same ones leaning hardest on aggressive promise-led creative.

Immediate actions
  • Review shipping thresholds, bundle logic, and subscription economics .
  • Lock in cut-off messaging early for the 4 May 2026 and 25 May 2026 bank holidays, especially for short-shelf-life products or promo-led campaigns.[13]
  • Recheck top-selling supplement and wellness SKUs for claims language across PDPs, inserts, paid social, and email flows.
  • Plan promotions around margin and stock depth, not just topline demand, because shoppers are clearly more offer-responsive than full-price confident.
How Move Fresh can help

We can help clients reset dispatch calendars around May bank holidays, pressure-test carrier and service mixes after the latest changes, and position stock more intelligently around promotion windows and repeat-order peaks. For health brands, we can also help reduce avoidable operational friction by making sure fulfilment touchpoints, inserts, and customer messaging stay aligned with tighter claims discipline.

References
[1] ONS, Retail sales, Great Britain: March 2026 (24 April 2026): https://www.ons.gov.uk/businessindustryandtrade/retailindustry/bulletins/retailsales/march2026
[2] Worldpanel by Numerator, British shoppers hunt for deals amid Middle East uncertainty (28 April 2026): https://worldpanelbynumerator.com/insights/british-shoppers-hunt-for-deals-amid-middle-east-uncertainty
[3] ONS, Consumer price inflation, UK: March 2026 (22 April 2026): https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/inflationandpriceindices/bulletins/consumerpriceinflation/march2026
[4] Royal Mail, Prices 2026 effective 7 April 2026: https://www.royalmail.com/prices2026
[5] Royal Mail, Surcharges and Correction Charges: https://www.royalmail.com/business/mail/surcharges
[6] DHL Express UK, Annual price adjustments for 2026 in the UK (26 September 2025; effective 1 January 2026): https://www.dhl.com/gb-en/home/press/press-archive/2025/dhl-express-announces-annual-price-adjustments-fo-2026-in-the-uk.html
[7] UPS UK, Shipping Costs and Zones: https://www.ups.com/gb/en/support/shipping-support/shipping-costs-rates
[8] FedEx UK, Shipping Rates & Tariffs: https://www.fedex.com/en-gb/shipping/rates/fedex-rates.html
[9] Evri, Our Prices: https://www.evri.com/our-services/our-prices
[10] Amazon UK, Amazon UK plans increased focus on online grocery delivery : https://www.aboutamazon.co.uk/news/retail/amazon-uk-online-grocery-delivery-amazon-fresh
[11] MHRA, Advertising investigations: March 2026 (10 April 2026): https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/advertising-investigations-march-2026–2
[12] ASA, Food, Food Supplements & Health Claims factsheet: https://www.asa.org.uk/static/3f5715ce-9cb4-4aba-9b249f6eb8859caf/Factsheet-for-MLM-Sellers-Food-Food-Supplements-Health-Claims.pdf
[13] Royal Mail, Service Update including May 2026 bank holidays: https://www.royalmail.com/service-update

Talk to our team about how we can build a solution for your brand at www.movefresh.com/contact/

The D2C Shifts Worth Watching – April Roundup Read More »

Why Scaling a D2C Food Brand Breaks Most In-House Fulfilment Setups

3PL, Move Fresh News / By

Every D2C food brand hits the same moment.

At first, fulfilment feels manageable. Orders come in. Someone prints the labels. A few shelves hold stock. Packing happens at the end of the day.

Then growth kicks in. Suddenly the same setup that worked at 40 orders a day starts to crack at 200.

This is the stage where many food and drink brands realise fulfilment is no longer a side task. It has become an operational system that needs structure, controls and proper infrastructure.

Parsley Box pick
The “Success Problem” Most Founders Do Not Expect

Growth is exciting, but it exposes weaknesses in warehouse processes very quickly.

The common signs look like this:

  • Stock stored wherever there is space
  • Multiple versions of packing instructions
  • Expiry dates being checked manually
  • Picking mistakes increasing during busy periods
  • Orders shipping later than planned

None of this means the team is doing a bad job. It usually means the operation has outgrown the setup it started with. Food and drink brands are especially vulnerable because operational complexity increases much faster than order volume.

Food Products Add Layers of Complexity

Running fulfilment for food and drink products is very different from standard ecommerce. Operators have to manage:

  • Warehouse HACCP plans and risk assessments
  • Shelf-life and expiry tracking
  • Batch and lot traceability
  • FIFO stock rotation
  • Product quality controls
  • Compliance with food safety standards

Move Fresh operates under BRCGS storage and distribution certification with dedicated quality and HACCP teams to manage these controls within the fulfilment environment.

The Hidden Cost of “Founder Warehouse Mode”

Many early-stage brands run fulfilment internally for longer than planned.

On paper it looks cheaper. In reality the costs show up elsewhere:

  • Team time spent packing rather than building the brand
  • Poor space utilisation as stock grows
  • Limited visibility of stock levels
  • Difficulty forecasting inventory requirements
  • Operational stress during promotional spikes
  • Real risk exposure to compliance

Growth can stall because operations start absorbing leadership attention. Founders should be thinking about product development, marketing and customer experience. Not reorganising shelves before a busy weekend.

These processes are designed for food supply chains, not general ecommerce warehouses.

Systems Matter More Than Space

The real difference between early-stage fulfilment and scalable fulfilment is not just warehouse size; it’s systems.

A specialist warehouse management system allows brands to:

  • Track expiry dates and batches
  • Maintain traceability for every order
  • Manage inbound stock checks
  • Monitor inventory levels in real time
    provide operational reporting for the business

Move Fresh’s WMS has been built specifically around food and drink logistics including shelf-life controls and traceability requirements .

For brands operating in regulated categories, those controls become essential as order volumes increase.

Packaging and Presentation Become More Important at Scale

When order volumes increase, packaging is no longer just a box. It becomes part of your operational process.

Brands often need to manage:

  • Multiple carton sizes
  • Protective packaging for fragile products
  • Promotional inserts
  • Gift packaging for campaigns
  • Custom delivery notes

Fulfilment operations and systems must handle these variations without slowing the pick and pack process.

Move Fresh supports custom documentation, kitting and personalised fulfilment options so brands can maintain their customer experience while scaling order volumes.

Scaling Operations Should Not Mean Losing Brand Control

One concern many founders have when outsourcing fulfilment is losing control of the customer experience. The reality is the opposite.

A well-run fulfilment operation gives brands:

  • Better stock visibility
  • Clear operational reporting
  • Consistent packing standards
  • Structured processes for growth

At Move Fresh, integrations connect ecommerce platforms directly with warehouse operations so the fulfilment process becomes a seamless extension of the brand’s systems.

When Is the Right Time to Change?

Most D2C food and drink brands start exploring fulfilment partners when they reach around 100 orders per day. At that point:

  • Manual processes become harder to maintain
  • Stock complexity increases
  • Warehouse space becomes limited
  • Operational and compliance risk grows

The earlier brands build a scalable fulfilment structure, the easier it becomes to support growth. Your warehouse should feel like part of your business, not a black box.

Building Fulfilment That Supports Growth

Scaling a food brand is already hard enough. Your fulfilment operation should help you grow, not hold you back.

With specialist food logistics expertise, BRCGS certified processes and technology designed for D2C operations, Move Fresh supports brands that are ready to move beyond early-stage fulfilment setups and build something scalable .

If you are starting to see operational growing pains in your fulfilment setup, it may be time to rethink the model.

👉 Talk to our team about how we can build a solution for your brand at www.movefresh.com/contact/

Why Scaling a D2C Food Brand Breaks Most In-House Fulfilment Setups Read More »

Managed Packaging for D2C Food and Drink Brands

3PL, Move Fresh News / By
Stop Buying Boxes. Start Shipping Smarter.

Most D2C food, drink and health brands don’t set out to become packaging buyers.

Yet somewhere between your first 100 orders and your first 1,000, you’re suddenly:

  • Negotiating box prices

  • Ordering pallet loads of mailers

  • Storing void fill in the corner of your office

  • Running out of branded sleeves at peak

  • Guessing how much stock to hold “just in case”

That is where a managed packaging service changes the game.

At Move Fresh, managed packaging is not just “we’ll hold your boxes”. It is a fully integrated service designed around compliance, cost control and operational simplicity for food, drink and health D2C brands

What Is a Managed Packaging Service?

In simple terms, we:

  • Design help and specify your D2C packaging

  • Source it through approved suppliers

  • Hold it in our BRCGS certified warehouse

  • Manage stock levels inside our WMS

  • Reorder automatically based on usage and forecast

  • Align it to your sustainability and EPR obligations

It becomes part of your fulfilment operation, not a separate headache.

Why Packaging Is a Bigger Risk Than You Think

For food and drink brands, packaging is not just branding. It is compliance, margin and customer experience.

1. Cash Flow Gets Trapped in Cardboard

Minimum order quantities for printed packaging are rarely founder-friendly. You end up tying up working capital in:

  • Six months of printed outers

  • Seasonal inserts you hope will still be relevant

  • Bespoke mailers that do not flex with SKU changes

A managed model smooths that out. We hold and manage it. You pay in line with usage.

2. Compliance Is Not Optional

As a BRCGS certified storage and distribution operation we treat packaging like a food contact component, not just a marketing asset.

That means:

  • Controlled storage conditions

  • Batch traceability where required

  • Inbound quality checks

  • Clear segregation and FIFO controls

For brands navigating Food Standards Agency guidance, HFSS regulation, or expanding into retail alongside D2C, that control matters.

3. Peak Breaks Weak Packaging Plans

Black Friday. January health kicks. Subscription spikes.

If your packaging supply chain is not aligned with your fulfilment partner, you get:

  • Missed cut-offs

  • Substituted materials

  • Delays while waiting for a reprint

  • Higher courier costs due to poor carton optimisation

Because our WMS is built around food and drink operations, including traceability and shelf-life controls packaging consumption is visible alongside order and stock data. We can forecast demand properly, not guess.

Packaging as a Revenue Lever, Not a Cost Line

Too many brands treat packaging as a cost centre.

Done properly, it drives:

  • Higher AOV through gift wrap and personalisation

  • Reduced damage rates

  • Better unboxing experience

  • Improved repeat purchase

  • Lower shipping cost through right-sized cartons

We integrate personalisation, custom delivery notes and gifting into the pick process. That means:

  • Custom labels

  • Engraving where relevant

  • Gift inserts

  • Campaign-specific packing flows

You can run a seasonal campaign without building a mini warehouse in your office.

Sustainability and EPR: Built In, Not Bolted On

UK brands now face Extended Producer Responsibility reporting requirements.

Through our managed packaging model we support:

  • EPR reporting data

  • Packaging material tracking

  • Reduction initiatives

  • Zero waste to landfill operations

  • Scope 1, 2 and 3 impact data for your brand

We work with you on material selection and packaging reduction, not just pallet storage.

If you are promising customers lower-impact delivery, your packaging operation needs to back that up.

A Practical Example

A fast-growing ambient meal brand comes to us shipping 300 orders per day.

Before Move Fresh:

  • Founder ordering boxes from three suppliers

  • No visibility of packaging stock

  • Frequent over-ordering “just to be safe”

  • Cash tied up in slow-moving printed sleeves

  • No formal EPR reporting structure

After moving to managed packaging:

  • Single specification signed off

  • Stock held and monitored in our warehouse

  • Automated reordering triggers

  • Integrated pick standards and carton sizing

  • Full reporting for EPR submission

Operations team freed up. Working capital improved. Peak handled without panic.

Why It Works at Move Fresh

We were founded by food and tech entrepreneurs with direct D2C brand experience.

So we understand:

  • Why founders obsess over unboxing

  • Why ops teams worry about damage rates

  • Why finance teams care about cash tied up in packaging stock

  • Why compliance cannot be an afterthought

Our in-house developers connect your ecommerce platform directly to our WMS and wider systems. Packaging, fulfilment, carrier logic and reporting all sit inside one joined-up operation.

It is not glamorous. It is just well controlled.

And that is what scaling food and drink brands actually need.

Is Managed Packaging Right for You?

It tends to make sense if you:

  • Ship 100+ orders per day

  • Have multiple SKUs or subscription models

  • Run seasonal or gifting campaigns

  • Want better cash flow control

  • Need structured EPR and sustainability reporting

  • Are tired of storing boxes in your office

If that sounds familiar, we should talk.

Book a packaging and fulfilment audit with Move Fresh and see where your current model is leaking margin.

Let’s make your warehouse operation feel less like a juggling act and more like a growth engine.

👉 Talk to our team about managed packaging at www.movefresh.com/contact/

Managed Packaging for D2C Food and Drink Brands Read More »

New Warehouse Facility

Move Fresh News / By

After a strong year of growth in 2025, Move Fresh has expanded into an additional site to support capacity requirements for 2026 and beyond.

The site is a few minutes from our main operation, fully integrated into our existing systems, and of course set up for food, drink and health D2C fulfilment.

It gives us additional storage and pick / pack capacity as volumes grow with racking optimised for euro and standard pallets.

If you’re a D2C brand shipping more than 100 orders a day then we’d love to help with your growth plans and save you money. Reach out to us here to see how.

New Warehouse Facility Read More »