Barrett Distribution Centers Named A 2022 Fast 50 Company by Boston Business Journal

For a growing brand, there are certain moments that make all the work behind the scenes feel worth it. Landing a major retailer is one of them. Maybe the business started with a small collection of products and a loyal group of customers ordering directly from the website. Over time, those orders became more consistent. The audience grew. More people started recognizing the name, and conversations that once felt aspirational began turning into real opportunities. Then comes the email, the meeting, or the purchase order your team has been working toward. A major retailer wants your product. It is the kind of news that deserves to be celebrated. It is also the kind of news that can transform the business almost overnight. Suddenly, the operation that has been comfortably supporting your direct to consumer business is being asked to do something very different. Instead of preparing individual orders for customers, you may be looking at cases or pallets containing thousands of units. Inventory that once supported one primary sales channel now has to stretch across several. New requirements enter the conversation, and the margin for error becomes smaller because the size of the opportunity has become considerably larger. Scott Wilkins, Senior Vice President of Customer Solutions at Barrett Distribution Centers, has spent 14 years with Barrett and has watched brands reach this exact point in their growth. In some cases, the shift happens faster than anyone anticipated. A sales team lands the retailer it has been pursuing, the excitement spreads throughout the company, and then someone asks the question that brings everyone back to reality: How are we actually going to handle this? Retail Changes the Rhythm of Your Business Direct to consumer fulfillment can become familiar over time. An order comes through a website or marketplace, a few products are picked and packed, and the package travels directly to someone's home. Retail operates differently. Orders may move by the case or pallet rather than as individual packages. Products might be headed to a retailer's distribution center or directly to stores. Inventory requirements can change, and retailers often have their own expectations surrounding how products are prepared and delivered. Then there is the sheer size of the opportunity. As Scott explained, “A PO to Walmart could be tens of thousands of units, right? Hundreds of thousands of dollars.” That kind of order can propel a brand forward quickly, but it also raises the stakes. Scott points to retailer requirements and chargebacks as areas where brands need to be particularly careful. “Brands can get into trouble really, really quickly if they don't really have a 3PL partner that can handle everything that a retailer is gonna throw at them.” For brands making this transition, a few areas deserve particular attention: Retailer requirements: Every retailer operates a little differently, and understanding those expectations before orders begin moving can prevent expensive mistakes. Inventory planning: A large retail order can consume inventory quickly, especially when ecommerce customers are still ordering from the same product assortment. Order profiles: Shipping individual packages to consumers is very different from preparing cases or pallets for stores and distribution centers. Retail compliance: Labeling, routing, documentation, packaging, and delivery requirements become increasingly important as larger retailers enter the picture. Room for what comes next: One successful retail relationship can quickly lead to another. Your fulfillment operation should be prepared for the business to continue evolving. None of these considerations make landing a retailer any less exciting. They simply illustrate why the fulfillment conversation changes as the opportunity gets bigger. Has Your 3PL Done This Before? When a brand begins evaluating whether its current fulfillment operation can support retail growth, the number of questions can quickly become overwhelming. Technology, locations, capacity, pricing, systems, and capabilities all deserve consideration. Scott recommends starting with something much simpler: “Tell me about some of the customers that are like me.” It is a straightforward question, but the answer can reveal quite a bit about the experience sitting across the table from you. If you are an apparel brand preparing to enter mass retail, has the 3PL supported similar apparel companies? If Walmart is part of your future, does the provider already understand what fulfilling Walmart orders involves? What challenges have similar brands encountered, and what did the 3PL learn from helping them through those situations? More importantly, Scott encourages brands to understand what their own teams need to be prepared for when entering these relationships. A strong 3PL should not simply tell you what it can do. It should help you understand what successful growth will require from your business as well. That is where experience begins to feel less like a credential and more like a resource. “We're as much consultants to a lot of these companies as a fulfillment and 3PL and warehouse provider,” Scott said. “We're solving problems every single day.” When your company is entering unfamiliar territory, having people around the business who have already encountered similar situations can make that next step considerably less daunting. Sometimes Growth Arrives Before You Feel Ready There is a funny thing about growth. Companies spend years pursuing it, but the biggest opportunities rarely arrive at the perfect moment. A sales team lands the account everyone has been chasing. The purchase order comes through. Everyone celebrates. Then someone eventually asks the practical question: How are we going to handle this? Scott has seen that exact scenario play out. “There’s been more than a number of examples where we get a phone call like one of their sales guys just landed a huge PO with Walmart and they're like, ‘My gosh, how are we gonna handle this?’” For Scott and the Barrett team, the response comes from having navigated those situations before. “We got you. Like we'll walk you through it, we'll tell you how to handle it.” There is something reassuring about those words because they capture what a strong fulfillment relationship should provide during a period of change. Your 3PL should not become another problem your team has to solve when a major opportunity arrives. It should be one of the reasons your team feels prepared to pursue that opportunity in the first place. That does not mean every transition will be effortless. Retail introduces complexity, and every brand has its own requirements. What matters is having experienced people who can recognize potential complications early and help your team work through them before they grow into larger problems. The First Retailer May Only Be the Beginning A brand rarely grows in a perfectly straight line. A company might begin by selling exclusively through its own website before adding marketplaces, retail, wholesale, or other channels. One retailer may become several, while the ecommerce side of the business continues growing at the same time. Scott has watched Barrett evolve alongside brands making exactly that transition. What was once a more traditional warehousing business has expanded into a broader omnichannel model capable of supporting direct to consumer orders alongside the very different demands of retail. The idea is to give brands room to grow without forcing them to rethink their fulfillment relationship every time the business reaches another milestone. Scott refers to this as finding a “forever 3PL.” Brands, he explained, “don't wanna start somewhere and then have to find a new 3PL as their business grows and it changes.” That perspective becomes especially relevant after landing a major retailer. The immediate purchase order deserves attention, but so does what might follow it. If another retailer comes calling six months from now, the fulfillment foundation should make that conversation easier, not more intimidating. Be Ready for What Comes Next Landing a major retailer is validation that something is working. Your product has earned attention, new customers are within reach, and the business is stepping into a larger arena. Your fulfillment operation should give you the confidence to enjoy that moment rather than immediately wonder whether you can keep up with it. Scott describes Barrett's role in this stage as helping brands navigate “that switch or that evolution or that level up” as they become more sophisticated omnichannel businesses. That is ultimately what the right fulfillment relationship should make possible. It is not simply about getting one enormous purchase order out the door. It is about creating a foundation that can accommodate the opportunities that follow without losing sight of the customers who helped the brand get there in the first place. So celebrate landing the retailer. It is a big deal. Then make sure your business is ready when the next one calls.