Developing vehicle routing and outbound fulfillment systems for an E-grocery company

This paper outlines areas for improvement within the outbound fulfillment network of an emerging online grocery ("e-grocery") company offering home delivery to the customer. In particular, the research focuses on developing an efficient, scalable home delivery network, as a result of the known challenges and relatively high fulfillment costs associated with this business model. Last-mile home delivery accounts for a substantial portion of total e-grocery fulfillment costs. The Vehicle Routing Problem (VRP), a well-known NP-hard combinatorial optimization problem, is examined in the context of e-grocery and its impact on last-mile delivery costs. The paper emphasizes an integration of scalable vehicle routing systems with efficient order fulfillment operations. Practical analytical approaches, as well as new case experiments, serve as a framework of recommendations for an emerging e-grocer or similar last-mile delivery provider. The paper presents analysis using a real case study, serving as a basis for example, as well as more broad recommendations in the field. Moreover, it directs the reader to a wealth of literature in the fields of logistics, grocery fulfillment operations and the VRP class.

Department dc:contributor.department

Leaders for Manufacturing Program at MIT

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2009

Author dc:creator

• Barker, Nicholas (Nicholas Abraham)

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Daniel Whitney and Donald Rosenfield.

• Sloan School of Management.
• Mechanical Engineering.
• Leaders for Manufacturing Program.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/50096

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/50096