The time has come — your enterprise is in dire need of a new warehouse management system. Maybe you’re just beginning your journey into the world of WMS, or perhaps your enterprise has grown to the point where your old software solutions no longer work. In any case, a pivotal step in the process is creating a strong warehouse RFP.

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Either way, this should come as no surprise because, according to IBISWorld, public storage and warehousing revenue is expected to increase by $35.4 billion this year, with a CAGR of 2.7% in the last five years. It’s not shocking to see warehousing expand as supply chains grow in response to growing markets.

Now your quest begins: you must hunt down the perfect WMS for your enterprise. Unsure of where to start? Don’t worry, adventurer; our WMS RFP template and guide will help keep you on the path to victory.

Article Roadmap:

• What Is a Warehouse RFP?
  • Request for Information
  • Request for Proposal
  • Request for Quote
• Five Steps To Create Your RFP
  • Define Your Requirements
  • Build Your RFP
  • Identify Your Vendor Shortlist and Submit Your RFP
  • Review Responses
  • Follow Up
• What About a 3PL RFP?
  • Non-Disclosure Agreement
  • Response Format
• Questions To Ask
• Next Steps

What Is a Warehouse RFP?

A warehouse RFP is a document used in the selection or vetting process you send to vendors while searching for software solutions. It provides a set of inquiries, requirements, services required, special pricing and more. An RFP makes it easier for businesses to narrow down exactly what they’re looking for from vendors.

To better understand an RFP, we must consider its comrades in arms – the RFI and RFQ. Each represents information gathering at different levels of the search for a software solution. These three processes begin broadly with the RFI and move through the funnel through an RFP and an RFQ.

Let’s further discuss what you should include in your WMS RFP template.

Request for Information (RFI)

The request for information is your scouting party. This process involves surveying the vast hordes of WMS available to make general observations.

At this point, you aren’t ready to focus on a specific vendor or product. This step is where you begin your search if you are new to warehouse management or are still lacking in the experience department. Outside of spending some time searching on your own, sending an RFI should be your first step.

When creating an RFI for WMS, consider including elements like an organization overview, requirements, background information, evaluation criteria and submission process.

This step is a valuable portion of your quest for a WMS solution. While you gather data, you get a bird’s eye view of a wide assortment of vendors and how their products cater to different operations. An RFI is useful when you know you need a new system but aren’t sure where to begin looking for a solution.

Request for Proposal (RFP)

Deeper into the funnel, we have the RFP, our main topic of discussion. If an RFI is a broad expedition into unknown territory, an RFP takes the knowledge from that and narrows the focus. Don’t forget to add the below specifications in your proposal:

• Technical Functionalities: Specify requirements and features like inventory management, order processing, picking and packing, shipping and receiving, warehouse layout optimization, barcode scanning, real-time tracking, reporting and integration capabilities.
• Implementation Timeline: Indicate the desired project timeline, key milestones and deadlines to help vendors assess their capacity to meet scheduling requirements.
• Evaluation Criteria: Clearly define the criteria to evaluate vendor proposals. Include factors such as experience, expertise, financial stability, system functionality, scalability, ease of integration, ongoing support services and references from past clients.
• Pricing Structure: Request pricing details for the proposed WMS solution, including licensing costs, implementation fees, customization charges, ongoing maintenance and support costs, and other relevant expenses.

A well-crafted WMS RFP template helps you gather detailed and tailored proposals from potential vendors. Now, you can begin separating the wheat from the chaff and formulating a vendor shortlist.

We will take a more in-depth look at this further in.

Request for Quote (RFQ)

Only selected vendors that make it through all portions of the funnel will receive the RFQ for the final and most narrow requests. At this point, you should begin inquiring about pricing (hence the quote), integration and solution deployment.

Gathering and comparing pricing options from different vendors support informed decision-making based on cost-effectiveness and budget considerations. It streamlines the evaluation and selection process by narrowing down vendors to those who can provide competitive pricing.

This is when you require the most specific information about your target.

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Steps To Create WMS RFP

Finally, it’s time to set out on our quest to complete a robust WMS RFP template for warehouse management solutions.

At a basic level, your RFP should inform those reviewing it of your software needs and work to persuade upper management to begin implementing a solution to meet those needs.

Follow these next steps to conjure up a strong WMS RFP.

1. Define Your Requirements

This step is critical in crafting your RFP and is the foundation of what vendors will receive.

Deciding on your must-have list of requirements can be tricky. Now is a good time to seek input from stakeholders and those who’ll use this new software. Ensure you cover all bases and don’t leave out functionalities you’ll regret skipping.

• Look for gaps in your armor and other places you know need work. If you already have a warehouse management system, now is the time to do away with irritating or dated functionalities.
• Engage stakeholders and gather insights and input from various perspectives to ensure comprehensive coverage of your organization’s needs.
• Consider integration capabilities with accounting software, eCommerce platforms or shipping carriers.
• Identify key performance indicators (KPIs) you want to track, like order accuracy, inventory turnover, on-time delivery or labor productivity.

For a WMS-specific RFP, you’ll want to consider standard features like inventory management, billing automation, labor management and outbound operations. While these may not be pain points for your operation, you can find them in most software suites.

Discuss critical needs before moving on to wants. Do not skimp on this step. Ensure every department gets its say and that its needs are considered. No one wants to finish selecting and implementing a brand-new warehouse management software suite only to realize an entire department is missing critical functions.

See our free requirements checklist that prioritizes the features you need to succeed.

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2. Build Your RFP

Now that you’ve built a list of requirements, it’s time to incorporate them into your WMS RFP. Adding these requirements will allow vendors to show how their product meets your warehouse management needs.

At this point, you should focus on sharpening up your RFP. Organize your thoughts and maintain a professional-looking document if you want vendors to take you seriously.

Help vendors get you the information you need— a messy RFP can be confusing to answer.

Vendors should understand your warehousing operations from multiple angles. They can respond to your requirements and explain how their product solves your issues. Talk about the services you offer clients, your budget and technical specifications.

If you don’t have a team or the know-how to supply this data, finding someone who can or outsourcing this step of the journey is a good idea.

3. Identify Your Vendor Shortlist and Submit Your RFP

Here is where your RFI scouting party’s information comes into play. Your RFI should’ve taught you about the warehouse management market and uncovered at least five vendors you’re interested in contacting. If this isn’t the case, it may be time to send out the scouting party again and survey the battlefield until you have more information.

Moving forward without enough information will only do more damage in the end. Restart your RFI process, regroup and gather as much knowledge as possible. You’re looking for the perfect fit, not a system you’ll toss out after a week.

When this step is complete, you should run your RFP through a program like our RFP process with helpful scorecards, requirements templates and more. These tools make it easy for vendors to send you their proposals and for you and your team to handle communications with them.

It can take some time before you hear back from your target vendors, but if your RFP is easy to read and well-organized, you can rest easy knowing they’ll get back to you with valuable information as soon as possible.

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4. Review Responses

Don’t worry if a few weeks pass and you still have not heard from your shortlist of vendors. That may actually be a good thing. The more complete your RFP submission, the more information they can send back in response.

It’s common not to hear back from smaller vendors. Communicating through proposals may not be easy for them. If their product interests you and your team, you may need to approach them differently.

In the meantime, other vendors on your shortlist will deliver responses to your RFP. Take this step slowly. You’ve got your hands on some valuable information that will eventually guide you to your final WMS choice. Look over each document sent your way unless you have a team doing that for you.

Some vendors will go the extra mile and pass on information about functionality they think will benefit you. Keep an eye out for generic template responses. You want a personalized answer that fights for you as a client.

Finally, there’s one last step until you are ready to finish the fight and choose your top warehouse management solution.

5. Follow Up

You’re ready to start focusing on the perfect warehouse management system. By now, you probably have a few vendors you are no longer considering — they made it this far. Now let them know (courteously, of course) that they’re out of the running.

For the rest, you can push on to the final stages of your struggle. Now it’s time for them to show you what they can do.

Schedule a demo. Let the software creators walk you through how it works in real time. Have them present a proof of concept and show you how their software can solve a specific problem. Gather references on your final vendors. If your warehousing operation is large, you probably won’t get valuable information from a small enterprise.

A live demo that gives your team access to the software is especially helpful. You can get a lot out of this type of exercise as different departments can try out the software as they would normally. Any hiccups will soon come to light. If not, you may have a winner on your hands.

If you have any lingering questions, now is the time to get answers. Listen to your team’s opinions and value their input.

At this point, you can congratulate yourself. After choosing your strongest option, the only thing left is to consider how the rollout will proceed. Luckily, there shouldn’t be any surprises about how integration works after spending so much time studying your options.

Consider a few final points regarding the rollout of your new warehouse management software. You should spend some time training your employees to interact with the new software and ask your vendor if they provide any support for the integration process.

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What About a 3PL RFP?

You may be wondering — what do I do if my RFP’s aim is toward a 3PL or warehousing service provider (rather than a WMS software vendor) — be it for shipping, warehousing or order fulfillment purposes? The steps to create a warehouse RFP are largely the same, with a couple of extra considerations:

Non-Disclosure Agreement

It’s always a good idea to make sure your RFP starts with an NDA to protect the interests of both your company and the 3PL provider. The RFP will include sensitive information about your operations, processes and statistics. It will also prompt a good vendor to reply with a solution tailored to your needs.

This process can expose more information about the vendor’s capabilities and your own business than either of you will be comfortable with sharing – unless there’s an NDA in place!

Response Format

Different vendors may have varying response modes. It’s difficult to compare vendor capabilities and determine suitability if their proposals are formatted differently.

Including a response format is advisable to help them tailor the information they send according to your preferences.

A typical response format will contain the following:

• A summary of their company
• Operational details like locations, working hours and capacities
• Their management, operation and IT methodologies
• The solutions they propose to provide
• Case studies or references from satisfied customers

An easy way to get a strong idea of how to create a response format is to look through a WMS RFP template.

Question To Ask

A robust WMS RFP template must help you get a better understanding of the capabilities of the companies that you’re comparing. It should be detailed enough to keep you well-informed about vendors’ business operations.

At the end of the process, the template will equip you to answer the following questions about each vendor on your list:

• How much capacity do you have?
• What’s your geographic location?
• Are you growing? How much capacity will be available after a few years?
• What kind of network do you provide? Do your specialized services match our needs?
• Do your partners offer any advantage to my business?
• What’s your policy regarding order and inventory accuracy, shrinkage and receiving time?
• How do you manage returns and reverse logistics?

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Next Steps

There you have it, all the steps you need to consider when creating a winning WMS RFP template. Your goal should be to narrow down the perfect system on the first go, so don’t be afraid to invest time into the effort.

Our free comparison report offers an informative look at some of the top competitors on the market and how they measure up to each other. Those that are further along on the path to a perfect WMS integration can check out our free pricing guide for details on cost structures.

What are some of the biggest challenges you face when creating your warehouse RFP? Let us know below!