Archive: Apr 2002

Measuring Carrier Performance

You have just selected a new carrier. How do you make sure you’re getting the service you require? Rick O’Dell, president and CEO of Saia, a regional motor carrier based in Duluth, Ga., offers these top 10 metrics for measuring carrier performance. 1. Pickup performance. How can your delivery be made on time if your […]

Read More

Real-Time Visibility Ensures Real Savings

Cost control is an increasingly critical factor as companies fight to remain competitive. Simply put, if you cannot grow revenues, you must cut costs. Supply chain integration across business units is a leading cost-cutting measure, according to corporate managers responding to a recent Gartner Dataquest survey. One problem with most installed procurement and logistics systems […]

Read More

How Retailers Become Promise Keepers

Retailers today increasingly leverage online channels to offer services from third parties, including product drop-shipped from other vendors, cross-branded product bundles, and special orders. Amazon essentially built its business on this model and traditional retailers have followed. These strategies present great opportunities for new revenues, efficiencies, and service levels. But serious pitfalls exist, too. When […]

Read More

Logistics IT: Opening the Flood Gates

Eight years ago, Barbara Barnhill, transportation supervisor for Elizabeth Arden, excitedly shared her story with Inbound Logistics. She had started a revolutionary program that was racking up annual million-dollar savings by taking control of her inbound transportation. She did it using the latest technology—a fax machine. Today, fax machines have given way to web and […]

Read More

Logistics IT: Turning Up the Heat

While the red-hot pace of the logistics/supply chain IT market may have cooled somewhat, there’s still plenty of spark. Check out the latest IT applications for purchasing, order and demand management, supply chain planning, transportation, and warehousing. After a year or two of cooling off, the logistics/supply chain information technology market may be heating up […]

Read More

Building the Perfect Load

Logistics IT providers are helping shippers, carriers, 3PLs and consignees create cost savings with little capital investment thanks to innovative load planning applications. From better asset utilization to increased compliance, load planning software creates efficiencies before shipments enter the transportation stream. Have you ever lugged groceries home from the store, struggling to get as many […]

Read More

Dennis Hilborn: Know Thyself

“Who are we?” is one of Dennis Hilborn’s favorite questions. In his two and a half years as director of distribution at sports apparel maker Cutter & Buck, asking employees over and over who they are has helped him transform the Seattle-based company’s distribution center (DC). When Hilborn arrived at Cutter & Buck, “distribution was […]

Read More

Supply Chain Planning in a Global Environment

Last month’s column examined LogicTools Inc.’s LogicChain and LogicNet supply chain applications. This month, we talk with the person behind those applications—David Simchi-Levi, LogicTools CEO and president. In addition to running LogicTools, Simchi-Levi is a professor of engineering systems at MIT and the author of two books, including the prize-winning Designing and Managing the Supply […]

Read More