How to write a WMS RFP that works | Socius24

So, there you are. It’s Tuesday morning. You’re sitting in the weekly ops meeting, minding your own business, looking out of the window and idly wondering whether the good sandwiches are likely to survive until your lunch break. Then, the Operations Director casually looks up from their laptop and says those ten little words that are going to define the next eighteen months of your life:

“We need a new WMS. Can you look into it?”

So… that’s that. It’s all you’re going to get. And before you’ve even had time to sit up straight and finish nodding, the Ops Director moves on, and starts talking about something else.

Congratulations! You are now The WMS Person. It’s your baby, Baby.

Please note that there will be no training, there will be no confirmed budget, and there will be absolutely no acknowledgement that you already have a full-time job (LOL). What there will be is a vaguely uneasy sensation that will settle in immediately after you realise that you’re supposed to have this all sorted by Q3.

Now, being totally honest, RFPs are nobody’s specialist subject. Most warehouse people buy a WMS once, maybe twice, in their entire working life. You could compare doing this kind of thing to buying a house (if that house also needed to integrate with your ERP, your TMS, your LMS, survive Black Friday, coordinate millions of transactions, in real-time and simultaneously win the approval of every member of the night shift). Easy peasy, Lemon etc.

So, you do what any sane person would do. You type “WMS RFP template” into Google, you download the first spreadsheet that doesn’t look like it’s going to cause a major security breach, and you get cracking.

Which is, Dear Reader, where things usually start to go horribly wrong.

The RFP spreadsheet of Doom: the downloaded template problem

OK, firstly, that template you downloaded? Is it the one that was written in 2011 by the WMS consultant who has since retired to Portugal? If so, it’s got about 600 requirements, a good twenty percent of which refer to technology that no longer even exists. “Must support handheld terminals running Windows CE.” Don’t know what Windows CE is? Yeah, don’t worry, these days, neither does Microsoft.

But it LOOKS good, it LOOKS thorough, it LOOKS professional. So… off you send it to six different vendors, every one of whom recognises it on sight, because they’ve seen it before. Lots of times. Occasionally multiple times during the same month, from different companies, and all with that same typo in row 214.

Mostly, those vendors will respond exactly as you’d expect: politely, comprehensively, and without really understanding one single relevant thing about your warehouse operations.

When every requirement is essential (so nothing is)

Then there’s the requirements spreadsheet with a thousand rows, and every last one of them is marked “Essential”. This usually includes such gems as “system must be capable of sending email”. Essential. “System must have a user interface.” Also, essential. Apparently. In stark contrast to what… all of the telepathy-based options?

But I digress.

The problem here is simple (but not necessarily easy to fix). Because when everything is essential, nothing is. A thousand-row spreadsheet with one priority level is not a useful filter. And if you use something like that, we know of vendors who will simply tick all of the boxes, in the serene conviction that it’s deeply unlikely you’ll ever go back and check up on them.

And THAT means that you’ll most likely get six effectively identical spreadsheets, all with reassuringly green columns, by return of email. Which, in turn, means that you’ll be precisely nowhere closer to making a decision than you were before you sent that spreadsheet out.

The Mystery Novel: the RFP that describes no warehouse

This is my personal favourite: the RFP that tells a potential vendor absolutely nothing about your operation. No throughput volumes. No order profiles. No hint that half your warehouse is chilled, and a quarter of it is bonded. No mention of wandering cut-off times, or the mezzanine at the far end of the furthest building, where you keep all of your obsolete stock.

When this happens, vendors are left to guess. Because (and this is said with love) you’ve given them no choice. Which means that if you’re talking to six different vendors, then that most likely means they’re going to imagine six different warehouses and that they’ll deliver six different quotes, which are, obviously, going to vary by an absolutely bonkers degree.

Top Tip: if you did this, please don’t plump for the cheapest one before you’ve asked some more questions.

Which brings us, finally, to the useful bit of today’s presentation, hurrah!

How to write a WMS RFP the RIGHT way (for YOUR warehouse)

Step One: take a deep breath.

I promise, it’s not particularly complicated (although, I get it, it looks like it’s going to be). Creating an RFP that will deliver what you actually want and need means that you’d be best to ignore that Googled template, and instead, start from the opposite end of things entirely.

1. Describe your current, actual, real operation before you start talking about your dream WMS

Start with the truth. Wild. I know. But I promise that no-one is marking your warehouse out of ten.

What WMS vendors need is accuracy and specificity, because those awkward bits that you really don’t want to talk about are exactly the same things that your new WMS is going to have to be able to deal with at 6am on the Monday after go-live.

So, tell us about your volumes, tell us about your SKU count, your order profiles, your peak (and exactly how bad it got last year). Tell us about your integrations, your growth plans, and ESPECIALLY, tell us about the awkward bits. Talk about the chilled section. The bonded stock. The customer who always insists on their own labels. And for the love of Peak, tell us about any erratic shipping conditions.

It’ll make life so much easier in the end. Really it will.

2. Sort through your requirements: must, should, and no

Pretend you’re going on holiday and flying Ryanair. You know how you need to pack: create three piles. Must have. Should have. Lovely to have, but yeah, no. And then be brutal with the first two piles.

And that’s because a short, but realistic list of things that you genuinely cannot operate without tells a vendor infinitely more than a thousand ticked boxes ever could. It also lets them tell you, early on and as cheaply as possible, whether you’re a fit for each other. I appreciate that it might not feel like it but getting a quick “no” from a vendor is a precious gift and you should treasure it.

3. Pay attention to the people, not just the product

The software matters. Of course it does. OBVIOUSLY, it does.

But when a WMS project goes wrong, the product itself is rarely the only culprit. The problem almost always started during the implementation period: the requirements collection, the mapping, the planning, the data, the config, the testing… the humans.

So, ask who will spec your new WMS, who will do any config you need, and who will actually turn up on site. When? Ask them how long they’ve been doing this kind of thing. Ask them which industries they’ve worked in previously. Where? Ask who will be overseeing your project. Read the case studies. Ask for reference customers that you can phone, and then ACTUALLY phone them. Maybe even go for a site visit and see the software in action.

And always (always) ask the one question that really matters, which is “would you use these people again?”

4. Make their WMS demo do your work

Do not accept the standard demo.

If you’re offered a standard demo, just say no. Because most of the time, standard demos are a work of theatre that have been rehearsed for years. They’re usually set in a suspiciously perfect warehouse, where every order has three lines, where every single location has been clearly labelled, and where nothing has (in the whole recorded history of time) ever been out of stock.

Instead, send vendors YOUR data (remember to anonymise it first, to remain GDPR compliant). Send them your real orders, send them your real SKUs, and your real edge cases. Most importantly, include any specific scenarios that make your warehouse manager want to cry. And then, ask them to walk through their WMS using your data, live, and while you watch. You’ll learn more in forty minutes than you could from any number of pages of carefully ticked boxes.

5. Tell the truth about budget and dates

Everyone plays coy when it comes to budget.

People do this because they think that revealing a number usually means paying that number. But an RFP that has no budget range and that has a go-live date of “ASAP” only makes for ineffectual guesswork that creates downstream problems for both parties. If the honest answer is “we have roughly this much to spend, and we need everything in and working before next peak hits”, just say so.

You’ll find out very quickly who can actually work within your parameters. Now, compare that to the folks who were going to waste three months of your life before they let you find things out the hard way.

Full disclosure: why a better RFP suits us too

RFPs land on our desks all the time: the good, the bad, and the ones with that typo in row 214. So yes, I have a (deeply personal and) professional interest in you writing a more effective one.

But, quite honestly, our interest in getting it right absolutely aligns with yours. Because a clear, honest RFP means that you’ll be able to get the kinds of answers from us that you can then compare to the ones you get from other vendors and other systems: apples to apples, oranges to oranges.

If you RFP the right way, WMS vendors can give you information that survives first contact with reality. Which means that everyone involved can skip the eighteen-month magical mystery tour. And that is definitely a good thing.

Anyway, if you’re currently staring down the barrel of “can you look into it?” and you’d like a second pair of eyes on your draft RFP before it goes anywhere, we’re happy to oblige.

Book an obligation-free discovery call and bring your spreadsheet with you.

You won’t scare us, honest. But you’re very welcome to try 😉

Writing a WMS RFP: FAQ

What should a WMS RFP include?

Describe the operation you have before you describe the system you want. Volumes, SKU count, order profiles, what your peak actually looked like last year, the integrations you already have, your growth plans, and the awkward bits: the chilled section, the bonded stock, the customer with their own labels, the wandering cut-off times. Then create a short, prioritised requirements list rather than an exhaustive one.

Should I use a WMS RFP template?

It is not a particularly useful place to start. Most templates are years old, carry requirements referring to technology nobody uses any more, and are recognised on sight by vendors who have seen the same document arrive from several companies in the same month. A template also describes a generic warehouse rather than yours, and yours is the only one the vendor needs to understand in order to quote properly.

How many requirements should a WMS RFP have?

Fewer than you think, and sorted into tiers. A thousand rows that are all marked Essential is not a filter, because it simply cannot tell one vendor from another. Must have, should have, and lovely to have, then be strict about the first tier. A short realistic list tells a vendor more than a thousand ticked boxes, and it lets both sides work out early whether you are a fit.

Should I include a budget in a WMS RFP?

Yes, as a range. An RFP with no budget and a go-live date of “ASAP” leaves vendors guessing, which is how you end up with six quotes that vary wildly. Say roughly what you have and roughly when you need it, and you will find out very quickly who can work within those restrictions.

What should I ask a WMS vendor about implementation?

Ask who will spec it, who will configure it, who will turn up on site and when, how long they’ve been doing this, and which industries they’ve worked in. Ask who oversees the project. Ask for reference customers you can phone, then phone them, and ask whether they would use the same people again. When a WMS project goes wrong, the software is rarely the only culprit.

How do I get a useful WMS demo?

Decline the standard one. Send your own data instead, anonymised first for GDPR. Include your real orders, your real SKUs, and the edge cases that make your warehouse manager want to cry. Then ask the vendor to work through those scenarios live, while you watch. Forty minutes of that beats any number of pages of ticked boxes.