Customer Service and Toys Essay

Submitted By yamyam128
Words: 2098
Pages: 9

Toys R Us / Babies R Us

TBS908 Supply Chain and Operations Management

Erman Yildiz - 4427919
Table of contents:
1. Castle Hill ‘Toys R Us’ Supply chain……………………………………………..3
1.1 ‘Toys R Us’ store interactions…………………………………………………3
1.2 Store interactions with head office……………………………………………3
2. Competitive priorities……………………………………………………………….4
2.1 Delivery speed…………………………………………………………………..4
2.2 Consistent quality……………………………………………………………….4
3. Efficiency of supply chain………………………………………………………….4
3.1 Product variety/diversity……………………………………………………….4
3.2 Inventory management………………………………………………………..5
3.3 Product recall…………………………………………………………………..5
4. Renewing their offering to customers……………………………………………6
5. Areas of improvement……………………………………………………………..7
5.1 Floor Assistance……………………………………………………………….7
5.2 Delivery Time…………………………………………………………………..7
5.3 Regulation………………………………………………………………………7
6. Process map………………………………………………………………………..7
7. References………………………………………………………………………….8
1. Castle Hill ‘Toys R Us’ Supply chain
1.1 ‘Toys R Us’ store interactions
The departments gathered at ‘Toys R Us /Babies R Us’ were from the Castle Hill store. These departments included ‘Baby Registry’, ‘Bike Building’, ‘Shop Online’, ‘Furniture Assembly’, ‘Management’, and ‘Back Room/Delivery dock’. As observed on premises, the departments were segregated from one another; however interaction was needed in the assistance of customers when transferring customers between departments.
There is a store layout map where the customers can view and initially help themselves until they are approached by or ask for assistance from floor staff, which then guides the customers to their desired department.
When an online purchasing transaction is completed, the products are delivered directly to customers address, or alternatively, the proximity finder locates the nearest store to pick up the product. Once the store receives an online purchased order, item details are handed to ‘Backroom’ department where the product is then picked and handed to ‘Delivery’. If the customer chooses the ‘pick up’ option, the purchased order is held in the ‘backroom’ until the customer presents proof of purchase documents to the ‘pick up’ area. Additionally, ‘Toys R Us’ offers assembly of some of its products which is done by ‘Furniture Assembly’ or ‘Bike Building’ departments; which is then handed back to the ‘Back Room’.
1.2 Store interactions with head office
Two head office departments include ‘Human Resources’ and ‘Information Technology’. The head office and local stores work collaboratively together. The store notifies the head office of needed positions whereby the ‘Human Resources’ department then makes appropriate advertisements. Store managers then interview applicants. Selection of staff and training is an internal process of the local store.
The ‘Information Technology’ department provides full technological support to all departments in ‘Toys R Us’ and network communication between stores and head office.

2. Competitive priorities
2.1 Delivery speed
The speed of delivery is an extra factor to the Toys R Us delivery standards. Toys R Us Australia [b] (2013) offers delivery to metro areas in 3 to 6 days and 4 to 10 days to regional areas. They have features such as ‘tracking your order’ which enables the customer to observe the status of their product delivery. An issue that Lariviere (2012) pointed out on Toys R Us logistics was that they need to be more efficient with delivery time when it comes to deciding if it is more suitable to deliver from a main headquarters or the nearest department store as they currently do so. This is important as they can utilise abandoned inventories, which in turn enables customers to receive products sooner, rather than waiting on restock of their local department store. An incident in 1999 Christmas time where Toys R Us were not able to meet delivery times was a major let down on behalf of the business (Beck 1999). This incident lead to