One of the things that stands out in warehouse work is that when a warehouse nears maximum capacity, every operation takes a lot longer. Often, it becomes necessary to shift existing inventory around before freshly arrived inventory can be stowed into storage slots. This effectively causes each operation to take twice as much time, or…
Supply chain efficiency plays a crucial role in determining a company’s total cost of business (TCOB) as well as customer satisfaction. For industries handling perishable products such as the grocery and pharmaceutical industries, order-to-delivery turnaround times are especially important to ensure that the products are safe for consumption by the end customer. An efficient supply…
Empty miles, a term that describes cargo vehicles traveling without a load of products that can be sold for a profit, have bedeviled merchants since the earliest days of trade. In the Age of Discovery, merchants would occasionally arrange stopovers at different continents to pick up cargos that could be sold for a profit. In…
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) estimates that around 14 percent of food is lost worldwide in production or the supply chain before even reaching retailers. Recently, more attention is being paid to this issue. In 2018, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) together announced…
A food item or consumer packaged good makes quite an interesting journey through the supply chain—moving from producers to manufacturing facilities to warehouses before ultimately reaching the supermarket. Though inflation and taxes play a major role in determining the prices of these products, the supply chain impacts final prices, too. For example, social distancing and…
People are often delighted to see a favorite childhood treat on the shelf of their local grocery store—and shocked at how expensive it is now. While factors like inflation, taxes, and regulations play a role in the prices of everyday food and consumer items, they are not the only forces at work. It takes a…