Inside Newegg: They give us a Tour and you a Prize
by Anand Lal Shimpi on February 14, 2006 3:31 PM EST- Posted in
- IT Computing
The Beginning
Our journey starts in receiving, this part of the process actually has nothing specifically to do with your order but what's done here makes the rest of the process infinitely easier. Shipping trucks will pull up to the warehouse and unload cargo pallets filled with computer products. A pallet is a wooden or plastic platform that can be picked up using a forklift; palletized cargo is cargo placed on a pallet, which is how Newegg's inventory is shipped to them.
Once the pallets are received and unpacked they are sent off to receiving, which is a mere 30 feet away. The pallets don't just magically appear at Newegg, they are ordered from a set of offices and cubicles attached to the warehouse:
What you see in the picture below are a few Newegg employees at computer terminals surrounded by hundreds of boxes. What they are doing is scanning each and every item that comes into Newegg. If it's a retail product, such as a boxed AMD CPU, then the retail barcode is used and information is attached to it. If it is an OEM product, such as an OEM AMD CPU, then Newegg will create their own barcode for the product. The bar-coding process is quite important because Newegg's system actually associates a great deal of information with each barcode.
For every product that's scanned not only are its specifications entered into the system but so are its physical dimensions and the weight of the product. The importance of this is that when your order is placed, Newegg's system knows exactly what size box(es) to ship your order in as well as how heavy your order will be. After your order is complete and before it is boxed up, the weight of the order (as well as the barcodes on each item) is checked against Newegg's database to make sure that you are indeed getting what you ordered.
In the far left corner of the picture above is a station where Newegg will take pictures of any new products coming into their warehouse, which end up being listed along with the product on their website.
After the products are received by Newegg, they are then sent to one of two places - the staging area or "the racks" where actively shipping product is organized and ready for orders that are being placed immediately.
The picture above is closest to the receiving area, and thus is the emptiest of the staging area. Newegg's facility here is no where near full capacity but also important is the fact that Newegg doesn't keep product for very long at all, which allows them to usually take advantage of the best pricing possible and in turn offer highly competitive prices to their customers.
The farther away you get from the receiving area, the more crowded the warehouse becomes:
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Blondie - Thursday, February 16, 2006 - link
The article was very informative. Thank you so much for taking the time to bring it to us.Bozo Galora - Thursday, February 16, 2006 - link
wow, anand is all growed up.I often wondered if the $50 million plus payout for AT site during the dotcom bubble that anand missed by just a few weeks has been made up for over the ensuing years. Hmmmmmmmmm.
Was it Sharkey that got $70 million or sumthin. LOL
Phiro - Thursday, February 16, 2006 - link
99.9999999% of those dotcom bubble payouts were in stock, which 99.99999% of the time dropped tremendously in value before they could unload any.So 99.999999% of your $50M deals turns into $50k deals.
jnmunsey - Wednesday, February 15, 2006 - link
Hey man NewEgg ain't got no white employees.. Those racist bastards!jnmunsey - Wednesday, February 15, 2006 - link
No wait I found 1 white guy in this pic from page 1 of the article.. The token white guy can be found here in the middle-left of the pichttp://images.anandtech.com/reviews/IT/InsideNeweg...">http://images.anandtech.com/reviews/IT/InsideNeweg...
andrep74 - Friday, February 17, 2006 - link
Yeah, have you ever read the requirements for getting a job there? You practically have to speak Chinese...yanman - Wednesday, February 15, 2006 - link
Anand, how about you use this chance to get NewEgg to offer international shipping for us poor aussies :)Schmide - Wednesday, February 15, 2006 - link
but with all that technology. How come my browser never starts on page 1 in their hot deals section. It’s always page 3 or 4. LOL.Slaimus - Wednesday, February 15, 2006 - link
Newegg got (in?)famous on Anandtech when they were the only one to sell the Radeon LE (Sapphire version imported from China, back in the day when all ATI was made by ATI themselves). It was far cheaper than the Made by ATI Radeon DDR. This got posted in Hot Deals forum and everyone was pleased with their fast and free shipping. They got in trouble, however, when people found out it was the LE (slower) version instead of the full Radeon DDR. There was a big uproar (I think the thread grew to 500 posts or so), and Newegg was forced to take in returns or offer price adjustments. This is also what started the cheap "refurbs" that newegg sells, which were just customer returns. This was probably also why Newegg started posting the core/memory speeds of graphics card they sell.kmmatney - Wednesday, February 15, 2006 - link
Heck yeah!!! I bought one of those Radeon LEs for cheap after the first debacle. I flashed the BIOS to a full Radeon. It gave me a top of the line $150 video card for $65!! Back then, top of the line as $150 :(.