Five years ago, supply chain leaders were thrust into a crisis no playbook could have prepared them for. Practically overnight, customer expectations shifted, demand surged and e-commerce became the default buying channel. To survive, retailers and wholesalers did what they had to: they rapidly adopted an array of point solutions (delivery apps, contactless payments, inventory tracking tools and more), often without time for proper evaluation or integration.
Today, those patchwork fixes have created a new kind of disruption: tech bloat. Redundant systems, siloed data and hidden costs are draining resources and stifling innovation. If the pandemic was a catalyst for transformation, the post-pandemic era is a reckoning.
In a recent webinar with Supply Chain Brain, OneRail Founder & CEO Bill Catania and Chief Product Officer Jeff Toewe addressed tech bloat, how tech bloat became a problem and the available solutions for today’s retailers. Continue reading to learn more, and watch the full webinar on-demand.
The Rise of Tech Bloat: How COVID-19 Changed Everything
When COVID-19 disrupted nearly every aspect of retail and wholesale, companies didn’t have the luxury of time. Store closures, inventory shortages and unprecedented spikes in demand forced organizations to act fast. Survival meant adopting new technologies at breakneck speed, often without a long-term strategy for integration or scalability.
“It wasn’t just a surge in demand — it was a surge in the requirement that items be delivered or picked up,” said Catania. With in-store shopping restricted, delivery and shipping became the only way to reach customers.
Several seismic shifts defined this period:
- Surging Demand for Home Delivery & Pickup: Shoppers expected goods to arrive at their doorstep — sometimes within hours.
- Acceleration of E-Commerce & Contactless Payments: Brands that had invested in e-commerce infrastructure seized market share, while others raced to catch up.
- Loss of Brand Loyalty in Favor of Availability: With supply chains under strain, consumers prioritized whichever retailer could deliver fastest.
While these rapid adaptations kept businesses afloat, they also laid the groundwork for a tangled web of disconnected systems. We now call that web tech bloat.
Hidden Costs of Fragmented Tech Stacks
The rush to rapidly build a logistics tech stack for the pandemic era solved immediate problems, but also created longer-term ones that are now impossible to ignore. As retailers and wholesalers layered tool after tool into their operations, many discovered they were trading one crisis for another: complexity.
At first glance, more technology looked like progress. But behind the scenes, fragmented systems were quietly eroding productivity, profits and customer trust. The point solutions implemented did not communicate with one another, and each added to the inefficiency and complexity of doing business.
Consider just a few of the hidden costs:
- Operational Inefficiencies: Employees found themselves performing “swivel chair” workarounds, jumping between screens, re-entering the same data and manually reconciling information across incompatible platforms.
- Redundant Systems & Licensing: In the scramble to move fast, many companies licensed multiple tools that performed overlapping functions, racking up unnecessary fees and maintenance costs.
- Disjointed Customer Experiences: When systems don’t talk to each other, the brand experience suffers. As Catania shared, “I ordered an iPhone during the pandemic and I think it was a DoorDasher showed up with it and it said I was getting the messages from DoorDash, not Apple. … as a customer, that wasn’t a very Apple-like experience.”
- Slow, Risky Decision-Making: Scattered data meant leaders couldn’t get a clear, timely view of operations. Reports were delayed or incomplete, making it harder to respond to issues or spot opportunities. “You really can’t ever count on the enterprise systems talking to one another,” Toewe said. “It’s just so expensive sometimes.”
- Soaring SaaS Costs: Layering subscriptions and integrations quickly ballooned IT budgets. According to Gartner, the average knowledge worker now uses 11 apps per day — more than double from 2019.
Collectively, these challenges drain resources and erode the agility companies need to compete in an on-demand world. The result? A tech stack that’s as much a liability as it once seemed like an advantage.
The Reckoning: Why Retailers Must Act Now
For many organizations, the real problem is that tech bloat still exists and continues to compound. As e-commerce continues to grow, the same fragmented systems that once seemed like a lifeline are now scaling inefficiency along with demand.
But there’s a huge opportunity for retailers right now: Contracting cycles that began in the early days of the pandemic are coming up for renewal. That means this is the moment when retailers must decide whether to keep paying for a stack that drains profitability — or reimagine how technology can work together to drive growth.
Financial pressures are also intensifying. Many companies are no longer able to justify redundant SaaS subscriptions, manual workarounds and inconsistent customer experiences. In an environment where margins are under scrutiny and customer expectations keep rising, maintaining the status quo isn’t sustainable.
“The solutions that can solve multiple problems are the ones that are winning — the solutions that can unlock value with one install, one integration to manage,” Catania said.
Lessons Learned & Best Practices
If the past five years have taught the industry anything, it’s that more technology isn’t always better — especially when every department buys tools in isolation. The companies emerging strongest from this period have taken a disciplined approach to streamlining their technology stacks and re-centering them around business goals.
Here are five of the most important lessons supply chain leaders are putting into practice:
1. Centralize Accountability
One of the fastest ways to create tech bloat is letting individual departments purchase solutions independently. Establishing a cross-functional governance team or PMO helps ensure every investment serves the broader strategy — and avoids costly overlap.
2. Prioritize Integration With Core Systems
The best tools are the ones that fit into your existing ecosystem. Modern solutions should offer proven integrations and reliable data flows to create a unified experience.
3. Balance Automation & Change Management
Even the smartest technology will fall flat without user buy-in. Investing in clear training, documentation and frontline support is critical. As Catania said, “Change management is our biggest challenge. That’s the hardest thing. It’s not the technology — it’s change management.”
4. Evaluate Build vs. Buy
While building in-house can feel more customized, it often brings higher maintenance costs and slower innovation. Many companies are choosing best-in-class platforms that can evolve with them, rather than trying to maintain homegrown systems. “Build less faster,” said Toewe. “Focus on a minimum viable product with no bells and whistles.”
5. Start With an Audit
Before adding (or removing) anything, map your current stack. Identify which systems are mission-critical, which are redundant and which are underutilized. You can’t fix what you can’t see.
Taking these steps reduces costs and complexity, and it also helps create the operational resilience to meet customers wherever they are, today and in the future.
Reclaim Control: Make This the Moment You Simplify
Tech bloat didn’t happen overnight, and it won’t disappear overnight either. But every day spent managing fragmented systems is a day your teams lose time, your customers lose trust and your business loses margin.
The imperative is clear: Simplify your technology stack, integrate your workflows and reclaim control over your supply chain. By unifying your systems, you can deliver the speed, visibility and experience modern customers expect — without the hidden costs holding you back.
Ready to see how industry leaders are making this transition? Watch the full webinar recording for deeper insights and real-world examples.
If you’re ready to explore how OneRail can help you build a unified, scalable last mile strategy, connect with a solutions expert.
