Harry Potter Logistics
July 22, 2007 by Splatty
Filed under Misc Logistics, Odd News
Harry Potter and logistics are two terms I never imagined I would hear in the same sentence. (Although, the logistics of navigating the long lines and throngs of “Muggles” eagerly anticipating the clock to strike midnight at my local grocery store last Friday was quite the challenge).
That was until I read an article by Eric Joiner at Freightdawg.com on the complexities of delivering the “Deathly Hallows” to thousands of different locations on time.
In the article, Eric does an excellent job of bringing the impact of supply chain management down to a very practical level.
While the secret rests in the millions of books printed, it is up to dozens of book sellers and their supply chain partners to get the books to waiting hands. 12 million books were printed for the US market alone. UPS, DHL, FedEx and the US Postal Service all carry parcel deliveries of the books, which by contract, could not appear in stores before mid-night July 21. LTL carriers such as Con-Way, SAIA and others will make hundreds of LTL drop shipments across the US.
In previous years this exercise has caused many transportation and warehouse vendors to increase security and product tracking, as well as contractually guarantee delivery not early…not late…exactly on time! God forbid the 12 year old next door gets her copy before your kid does! Amazon is said to have shipped 2.2 million Harry Potter books for delivery on Saturday morning the 21st of July. The US Post Office will carry 1.8 million books alone from warehouse sources.
I just read another article in support of the challenges of supply chain management in delivering goods throughout the world. Apparently people in war zones couldn’t wait either.
Via International Herald Tribune:
About 50 lucky foreigners working in Afghanistan got their hands on a copy of “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” on its release date Saturday, beating many of their friends back home who live near more conventional bookstores.
“I sent several text messages to friends and none of them had it yet, and they all said ‘I can’t believe you’re in Kabul and you got the book before us,’” said Jayne Cravens, 41, of Henderson, Kentucky, a U.N. worker.
John Connolly, an executive with Paxton International, a logistics and moving company, bought 50 copies of the book in Dubai at the exact time of its release in London. He boarded a plane to Kabul a couple of hours later with the books on board.
“Harry Potter is released worldwide at the same time. As a logistics company based in Afghanistan for five years, we saw every reason to include Afghanistan,” said Connolly, who asked customers to donate a book to the American University in Kabul in exchange for the free shipping of the book. “It was not on the publisher’s list, that’s for sure.”
Update July 23, 2007 – Just read an interesting article on geekzone.com about the massive amounts of “Deathly Hallows” processed and shipped by retailer Amazon.com.
Amazon’s U.S. fulfillment centers processed approximately 18 tons of “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” per hour and shipped to more than 43,000 zip codes across the country.
On its busiest pre-order day, Amazon.com took more than 1.75 pre-orders of “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” per second.
Across all of its seven web sites, Amazon shipped to more than 160 countries around the world.
***Disclaimer***I waited in line for my very pregnant wife who, by the way, finished the book in 8 hours.
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