grow its physical footprint. In the years that followed, Gopuff powered exponential growth across thousands of cities to cater to ever- growing demand. The company also aggressively expanded its selection and entered new categories such as OTC medications, electronics, home cleaning products, baby and pet supplies and groceries in addition to launching entirely new verticals such as Gopuff Kitchens (fresh food). Growth was also supported by a significant investment in core operational capabilities and foundational technology to facilitate deliveries such as optimized batching (multi-vertical orders) and routing solutions to efficiently scale the business. Gopuff hired executives and other key leaders and built a cross-functional structure focused on real estate, engineering, supply chain, product and technology. Gopuff expanded its physical network infrastructure by building a closely integrated hub-and-spoke network design, launching
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regional distribution centers that are strategically-located near the micro-fulfillment centers (MFCs). The MFC network itself expanded significantly, growing by 518% from 2018 to 2021, giving Gopuff a presence in major markets like New York, Los Angeles and Chicago. It’s one thing to expand the physical presence to gain customer coverage and another to scale it efficiently. An MFC in the Gopuff network averages around 6,000 square feet and is standardized to maximize assortment placement. During this period, new in-house technology was introduced to optimize the pick and pack algorithm that was vertically integrated between the upstream supply chain systems and downstream consumer facing interfaces. To enable the vertical supply chain flow, the company instituted multiple integrated layers of forecasting, pricing and replenishment capabilities that would orchestrate the end- to-end flow of goods from the vendor to the customer. These synchronized systems not only
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32 The Acumen
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