l Asda has two dedicated warehouses in Croydon and Watford serving one million customers in the London area, with two more scheduled to open in the second half of this year. It anticipates building a national network of 12-15 depots over the next three to five years. Director of home shopping Octavia Morley says Asda took US warehouses as its benchmark after looking at the various picking options. "Dedicated depots are more cost effective, don't compromise customer services in store and ensure a very high level of availability which is a major issue with home shopping customers. "Out of stocks aren't eliminated completely ­ we wish they were ­ but we have two methods of dealing with them. If we know the position, we mark them out of stock so customers can't order them, which avoids disappointment. If it's a depot shortage, we do overnight top-up picking in our stores. "The depot system enables us to forecast future demand and order to meet it." Morley says availability is increased by restricting the home shopping range to 5000 lines which will be gradually expanded. Pickers at Croydon are guided by infra red hand held terminals. l Somerfield's 24-7 service, launched in September, operates from two depots in South London and Bristol, with a third opening in March. It plans a network of 18 depots by 2005. The depots use the highly automated pick to light' system employed by Flanagans which the retailer acquired last year. The Bristol operation has been augmented with a new eFulfillment system that provides greater control and flexibility over picking and improves fulfillment by identifying stock location anywhere in the warehouse. Somerfield plans to use the system to order from remote warehouses, cross-docking goods directly into customers' order baskets, which will enable it to increase its product range. l Iceland's nationwide home shopping service, which makes 85,000 deliveries each week from 435 stores and went online last October, is firmly committed to store picking. Information systems director Martin Chatwin says investment has concentrated on developing store-based picking and delivery which we've found is a cost effective way of covering 97% of the country'. Out of stocks are dealt with by telephoning customers and offering a substitute. For large orders of more than six of one item, the online service contacts the delivery store to check availability, says Chatwin. {{FOCUS SPECIALS }}

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