Takealot's big boxing problem

There's a distributor I use daily that only seems to use one size box. A SINGLE SO-DIMM RAM module came in its packaging, inside an old SSD box, inside a old motherboard box, inside a box measuring 480 x 320 x 300 mm. A DDR5 SO-DIMM has dimensions of around 70 x 30 x 3 mm

That's a box with a volume of 46 LITERS for an item that has a volume of approximately 6.3 MILLILITERS. You could theoretically get more than 7,000 modules in the box (without packaging).
 
Even for pick ups at the warehouse, everything is boxed in a far larger box than it needs to be which is absurd,

They even have a massive cardboard recycling container by the exit where you can place the cardboard box. So the item is boxed for a 15 meter walk.
 
The comments are hilarious

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While I get that it may seem efficient to just pack and not look for the correct box or collate items surely this must cost efficiency later when the costs may be higher.
 
deweyzeph said:
It's pretty obvious why. They do this to get around the Post Office's absurd claim to be the only entity legally allowed to deliver sub-1kg packages. While most of the smaller courier companies in my experience just simply ignore this regulation, bigger players like Takealot seem to use 1kg volumetric weight boxes for shipping smaller items to get around the regulation. Just a guess, but could explain why.
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So it's not about actual weight?
 
RaptorSA said:
EDIT: In fact, just the other day I was browsing Takealot for a lekker moerse knife that looks like it can cut cardboard like butter.
I see what you did there Takealot.
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I use an ordinary box knife that I regularly snap/change the blade on. But I am always keeping my eyes out for a paper shredder that can handle cardboard boxes. I would love to be able to shred the boxes into something which easily goes into recycling bags or I can pack into bricks to be used as fire lighters.

I wonder if they could do a Map/Reduce style packing system. Instead of using cardboard boxes, the initial packers use plastic bins that they put the items in. These bins then go to a 2nd stage where they are combined into a single box.

Slap a programmable RFID chip on the bin, the packer scans the RFID chip to program it with the order number (or allocates the RFID chip id to the order number makes sense too), they pack the bin and place it on a conveyor, which goes through a "sorting" machine which ensures that all bins of the same order are directed to the same final packing station.

Packing material cost aside, it means they can put more orders in a single delivery vehicle, reducing the number of cars on the road that they need, which is a win for carbon emissions, road safety and I'm sure delivery cost.
 
Quicks said:
I for one love the fact they put everything in boxes to protect your products.

Ordered a Hard drive once from Takealot was delivered on a bike without a box or plastic bubble wrap. Just a carton sleeve, that drive did not last long before I had to return it.
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Hard drives are quite resilient and bumps while in use will usually only lead to some bad sectors as well. I'm guessing it was a dodgy drive to begin with.

Obieone said:
On a slightly different tack, I received a package recently from them which had two packets of coco pops inside along with the item I ordered, I think they used the coco pops as a sort of padding.
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Perhaps they just confused them with peanuts. Did you eat them? You don't know where they've been.
 
airborne said:
The reason why they pack orders into separate boxes is because they group items by their location in the warehouse, it’s more efficient with less stock shrinkage risk to do that than trying to first consolidate an order into a single location before packing it into boxes. Takealot does take it to a ridiculous level, like 3 small items may get 3 separate boxes, they need to get those packing robots that run around the warehouse picking stocking.
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LOL. Have you ever been inside an efficiently run warehouse?

This is BS - that's no reason and it's not a reasonable excuse for overuse of boxes.

Every warehouse will run efficiently if similar products/items are grouped together so that argument does not hold water. The problem here is inefficient utilisation of staff (pickers) or a broken system - more likely both.
Pickers are running to- and fro- between getting their (single line) orders picked and then packed & labelled, then rinse & repeat for the next (single line) order, and so on and so on! This just wastes time, effort and packaging/courier costs.

Why not do what every warehouse does and issue each picker a number of complete picking slips/orders at the same time? Then the same picker picks, packs & labels the carton/s once invoiced?

Methinks that their system is fooked and the single line items are being given to the pickers to be picked sequentially, for some obscure reason. I have worked with a few different Warehouse Management Systems (WMS) and my bet is that they are using SAP *spits*.
 
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