How Specialized Transportation Can Improve Customer Service
As a shipper, what does it look like to deliver on stellar customer service? Your buyers are looking for undamaged, on-time, seamless orders. But you are only able to control a portion of this. Somewhere along the way, a truck driver, warehouse worker, or dispatcher is involved in delivering on your customer service promises. Typically, […]
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How Driverless Trucks Will Change Supply Chain Strategy
In the popular 1985 movie "Back to the Future", it was predicted that by the year 2015, we would have the ability to fly our cars in the friendly skies. While that version of the future never became reality, we do have a major change to the state of transportation on the horizon with driverless […]
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Global Logistics—December 2016
TPP is Dead. Is NAFTA Next? A number of important policy issues are still up in the air for the United States, but President-elect Donald Trump has made one thing clear: The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is done. The TPP—a proposed free trade agreement between the United States and 11 Pacific Rim countries—became a target during […]
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Trends—December 2016
Happy New Year! Time for Your Annual Supply Chain Health Check Throughout the course of 2016, your supply chain was plugging away, receiving and handling new product lines, efficiently fulfilling e-commerce orders during slow times and peak periods, dealing with returns, and processing shipments to your stores and/or retail customers to ensure timely and accurate […]
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Joanne Wright: Turning Data Into Insight
Joanne Wright is IBM’s vice president of supply chain. She has held this position since 2013. Responsibilities: Strategy, execution, and business results for IBM’s manufacturing, engineering, procurement, logistics, fulfillment, and client solutions across more than 170 countries. Leveraging big data, analytics, and social media to create a world-class supply network. Experience: Numerous senior leadership positions […]
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Winning, With Integrity
MORE TO THE STORY: Empowering Women Through Engagement And Inspiration While building a career at 3M and its technology spinoff, Imation, Kirsten Hall never considered joining her family’s business, Logistics Planning Services (LPS) in Woodbury, Minn. "But I realized in 2010, when Mom and Dad were getting ready to step back, that I had been […]
Read MoreProtecting the Food Supply Chain
Food producers, distributors, and retailers need to ensure safe procedures are in place to protect the food they handle. These supply chain partners need to implement inventory best practices to guarantee SKUs are in the right store or facility at the right time to better meet customer service requirements. Inventory positioning is not guesswork. Instead, […]
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GOOD QUESTION | What logistics concerns keep you up at night?
To meet the needs of last-mile delivery, large e-commerce players are searching for prime real estate near population centers. With fewer good sites and skyrocketing warehouse/DC costs, 3PL storage margins are shrinking, and clients are unaware of pending rate increases. Richard Murphy, Jr., FASLA President & CEO Murphy Warehouse Company Retail is all about coordinating […]
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Times They Are A-changin’
Let’s say you are a manufacturer in the Midwest. You’ve got an excellent product line, a well-tuned supply chain, dedicated workers, and a great brand. Let’s say your company’s name is Harrier, because you have a long history of being a tough global competitor. The problem is, your competitors moved offshore, reaping competitive advantages such […]
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Getting Distribution Centers in Peak Season Shape
While the annual peak shipping season begins in August and lasts through the winter holidays, the work for supply chain and logistics distributors certainly doesn’t end come the new year. In fact, the National Retail Federation’s monthly Global Port Tracker report indicates that cargo volume for January 2017 is forecast at 1.53 million Twenty-Foot Equivalent […]
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