Archive: Feb 2009

Selecting the Lift Truck That Meets Your Need

When it comes to selecting the right lift truck, doing your homework and following a few simple rules can deliver higher productivity and lower operating costs. Martin Boyd, national product planning and marketing manager of Toyota Material Handling U.S.A., offers these tips for deciding which lift truck you need. 1. Factor in total lifecycle costs. […]

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Cutting the Fat from Equipment Redundancy

During a recent tour of a major logistics company, I was amazed at the emphasis placed on honoring commitments to the shipper. At every step of the process, the company had contingency plans in place to ensure that objectives were accomplished and shippers were satisfied. Then our guide indicated some idle equipment and explained it […]

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A New World of Logistics Enlightenment

Our annual education issue honors the importance and value of logistics education. Acing logistics basics helps practitioners master supply chain complexity. It’s practical to the core and strategic when it needs to be. But it isn’t static. The challenges of globalization continue to present new ways and means to engage learning. In this sense, history […]

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Why Comply?

Understanding the latest CBP programs and requirements involves homework and headaches. So…

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Joe Steffney: One for the Books

Examine Joe Steffney’s early career and a theme starts to emerge. He paid his way through college loading trailers for UPS. His first post-graduation job saw him supervising warehouse staff for Kmart. Then the story takes him to a series of distribution centers—Macmillan Publishing, Koen Books, Harcourt Brace, Houghton Mifflin, and Ingram Book Group. The […]

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Brokering Change

W hen I started in this industry in 1978, transportation companies were known as truck brokers. They primarily moved shipments of agricultural products under rates that were exempt from Interstate Commerce Commission regulation—that is, negotiable according to supply and demand. In 1980, truck transportation was deregulated. The term “property broker” was defined, and the industry […]

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Global Logistics-February 2009

The threatening economic cloud hovering over the United States is spreading eastward and casting a pall over European trade as it continues its global path. The continent is bracing for a gloomy forecast as pressures build, consumerism wanes, and mandates to reduce transportation costs flood corporate boardrooms. The current global downswing will stress transport rates […]

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Trends-February 2009

Boeing is making supply chain management a critical pivot as it tries to steer its way out of an economic vortex. As demand for new aircraft ebbs, and a machinist’s strike and failed component installation hamper the launch of the 787 Dreamliner program, the company is reconsidering its global supplier network. The Chicago-headquartered aircraft manufacturer […]

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