3PL Warehouse Benchmarking – Are you Getting Best in Class Service?
To find out how 3PL benchmarking can help you determine how well your 3PL warehousing partner is serving you, talk to a 3PL benchmarking consultant today.
Where You’ve Seen Us
How We Can Help
Why 3PL Benchmarking?
When you’re paying a third party to run your warehousing operation, you’re essentially trusting them to deliver best-in-class service at a fair cost. The honest question is: how do you actually know if they are? Most businesses don’t. And that’s not a criticism — it’s just that without an external reference point, there’s genuinely no way to tell whether the service levels and costs you’re getting are competitive, average, or quietly bleeding your operation dry.
That’s what 3PL benchmarking does. We give you that external reference point. The Benchmarking Success 3PL benchmarking service is specially designed for businesses using third-party logistics providers. We measure how well your 3PL is performing not against their own targets, but against comparable operations serving clients of similar size, sector and complexity.
Common Questions About Benchmarking Your 3PL
How do I know if my 3PL is actually underperforming, or if I just feel like they are?
The honest answer is that without external data, you can’t know for certain. That’s precisely the problem benchmarking solves.
My 3PL handles multiple clients from one facility. Can you still benchmark our specific operation fairly?
A reasonable concern. The short answer is yes our 3PL benchmarking is specifically designed for shared-facility operations, so we measure your service stream in isolation rather than averaging across their whole book of business.
Won't my 3PL just use better numbers if they know they're being benchmarked?
Another good question. The data collection process is structured and specific enough that there’s very little room to dress things up. We’re looking at actual cost and performance records, not self-reported summaries.
We've been with our 3PL for years and have a good relationship. Do we really need to benchmark them?
Look, a good relationship is genuinely valuable. But relationships and performance are two different things. Plenty of businesses are paying above-market rates to a provider they like. Benchmarking doesn’t have to mean confrontation, as it often just opens a productive conversation.
What do we actually do with the results once we have them?
The report tells you where the gaps are and what they’re worth in dollar terms. What you do with that is up to you. Some clients use it to renegotiate with their current 3PL, others use it to go to market. Either way, you’re negotiating with data rather than guesswork.
The Process
The BMS 3PL Benchmarking Process
Most of the people I speak to who use a 3PL have the same problem. They’ve got a sense that costs are higher than they should be, or that service levels are a bit patchy, but because they’ve never had an external reference point, they can’t say that with any certainty. The thing is, your 3PL knows exactly how they’re performing relative to the market. You probably don’t. That’s not a great position to be negotiating from.
What You'll Get
A like-for-like performance comparison
We compare your 3PL’s service levels and operating costs against comparable operations, meaning businesses running similar volumes, similar product types, similar complexity. Not industry averages. Actual comparable operations.
A cost breakdown that's hard to argue with
Labour costs, occupancy costs, facility costs. We go through each one and tell you whether what you’re paying is competitive, average, or above market. When you can see that in black and white, the conversation with your 3PL tends to go rather differently.
A clear picture of the performance gaps
We identify exactly where your 3PL is falling short of best practice, put a dollar figure on what those gaps are worth, and tell you what realistic improvement looks like. Some clients use this to renegotiate. Others use it to go to market. Either way, you’re doing it with data rather than gut feel.
A prioritised view of what to do next
Not a list of 40 recommendations that nobody acts on. A clear, sequenced view of where the highest-impact changes are and what good actually looks like for an operation of your size and type.