Pick Pack Ship

What is pick pack ship?

Pick pack ship (or pick pack and ship) describes the three-stage order fulfillment process warehouses and distribution centers use to complete customer orders:

  1. Picking products from storage locations

  2. Packing items into shipping containers with appropriate materials

  3. Shipping packages to customers via carrier services

A seamless and friction-free pick pack ship process means faster order fulfillment, lower labor costs and fewer errors.

The order fulfillment process in detail

Let’s break pick pack ship down into the three separate elements and look at how a robust warehouse management system (WMS) can support the pick pack and ship process:

Pick

Warehouse operatives retrieve items from storage locations based on pick lists generated by the WMS.

The WMS optimizes pick sequences to minimize travel distance, groups compatible orders for batch picking efficiency and directs operatives to exact locations using barcode scanning for verification.

Pack

Warehouse operatives pack items, selecting appropriate box sizes, adding protective materials, inserting packing slips and applying shipping labels.

These operatives follow packing instructions provided by the WMS that specify container types based on product dimensions and fragility.

Ship

Once packed, orders accumulate in staging areas, organized by carrier and service level.

The WMS generates manifests, schedules carrier pickups and transmits tracking information to customers. WMS also integrates with transportation management systems to enable carrier selection, rate shopping and shipment visibility throughout the delivery process.

Pick pack ship software capabilities

As well as WMS, pick pack ship software can integrate with other systems to ensure maximum efficiency and warehouse optimization:

Order management integration: This connects pick pack ship software to e-commerce platforms, marketplaces and ERP systems, automatically importing orders and fulfilling status updates. This eliminates manual order entry and provides customers with real-time shipping notifications.

Labor management integration: This tracks operative productivity at each stage, measuring picks per hour, packs per hour and accuracy rates. The software identifies performance gaps, suggests training opportunities and optimizes task assignments based on operative skill levels and workload.

Transportation management integration: This automates rate shopping, label generation and tracking number assignment across multiple shipping providers. The system selects services that balance cost and delivery speed commitments, supporting multi-carrier operations where needed.