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Agility gives a Decisive Competitive Edge in perishable categories.

Perishables have always posed a challenge to their distribution systems.

  • How frequently should we deliver to stores?
  • How much should we deliver?

These questions are at the heart of what distinguishes perishables from others.

  • Store inventory must be maintained within a narrow range
  • Higher inventory leads to expiry and return
  • Lower inventory leads to stockouts

Moreover, demand for these perishables varies significantly from day to day.

  • Weekends typically see a spike
  • So do festivals and holidays
  • Vacations and school closures often see a dip

 

It’s a real tight rope walk.

How do we run this supply chain? The answer lies in agility.

  • Predict near term demand considering all known demand drivers
  • Maintain store inventory allowing for prediction errors

An agile Demand Sensing based replenishment engine gives significant improvement on all the objectives.

  • Offer fresher products to consumers
  • Minimize expiry and returns
  • Minimize stockouts

In TOC parlance, we call it ‘Buffer Targeting’.

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Who Is Stealing Your Critical Production Capacity?

Capacity Shortages Don’t Need Fresh Investments!

How Do You Respond To Surprises In Your Supply Chain?

At What Granularity Should We Plan Various Supply Chain Activities?

Are Your Supply Chain Improvements Focused On The Major Impact Areas?

Selecting Vendors On Least Cost Basis Is A Costly Affair!

Does Intuition Play A Role In Supply Chain Execution?

Supply Chains Have A Lot Of Grey Areas

Root Causes Of Various Supply Chain Symptoms Converge!

Is Product Freshness Important Only For Perishables?

How Should You Handle The Noise In Demand Signals?

Why Do We Resist Frequent Forecast Changes?

Improving Teamwork Amongst The Supply Chain Members Needs A Fundamental Rethink

Do You Have A Cost Reduction Target Next Year?

Less Is More In Supply Chains

Is Your Production Plan Truly Demand Driven?

Tweaking The Planning Frequency Can Result In A Substantial Improvement In Supply Chain Performance

Cost Of Stockouts Is Often The Biggest Cost In Supply Chains

OTIF In Conversations Is Important For Supply Chain Excellence

Do You Classify Your Product Portfolio As ABC?

How Should We Set The Supply Chain Improvement Targets?

Is Your Supply Chain Getting Increasingly Complex?

Should You Segment Your Supply Chain?

For Eliminating Bullwhip Effect In Supply Chains, Transparency Of Demand Is Necessary But Not Sufficient

Is Your Supply Chain Cost Cutting Project Hurting Your Customers?

How High Are Your Supply Chain Ambitions?

Reliability Of Supply Chains Is Often Affected By Seemingly Innocuous Hygiene Factors

When Should You Allocate Stocks To Various Customer Channels?

Production Targets And Inventory Targets Have An Inherent Conflict

Do You Compromise On Flexibility To Gain A Reliable Supply Chain Performance?

Do You Witness A Gap Between Your Supply Chain Planning And Execution?

Do You Know The Short-Term Demand?

Is Your Supply Chain Stressed During New Product Introductions?

Have You Tried To Move Out Of Your Comfort Zone For Supply Chain Improvements?

Work Expands To Fill The Lead Time Available

Can Your Supply Chain Handle Grey Swan Events?

Where Should You Start Your Supply Chain Transformation Journey?

The Most Powerful Supply Chain Solutions Are Based On Inherent Simplicity

Is Your Supply Chain On A Continuous Improvement Path?

Should FMCG Companies Switch From Primary To Secondary Sales For Demand Predictions?

When Should You Relook At The Design Of Your Supply Chain?

New Year Resolutions – Why Some Of Them Stick While Others Don’t?

Challenges In 2021 Pushed The Boundaries Of Agility Even Further

How Should The Q-Commerce Companies Look At Assortment And Availability?

Is Consumers’ Purchase Intention Influenced By Product Freshness?

Pushing Extra Stocks To Your Channel Partners Is A Win-Lose Strategy

Refrain From Jumping Straight Into The Optimization Models!

Agility Of A Supply Chain Is Tested During Consumer Promotions

Give Your New Products A Chance To Succeed

Is Your Distribution Network Optimized For Agility? Or Cost?

How You Share The Value Surplus With Your Customers Is Key To Maximizing Your Throughput

Is Your Solution Customized To Solve Specific Pain Area Of The Customer?

Should We Perform ABC Analysis On Emerging Trends?

How Do You Navigate Speed Breakers?

Who Is Your Most Demanding Customer?

Who Should Publish A Company’s Supply Chain Scorecard?

Can Quantum Theory Provide A Solution To Multitasking?

Success In Q-commerce Requires The Highest Level Of Supply Chain Agility

Embrace Uncertainty

Good Habits Die Hard

Handling Diverse Functions Early In The Career Helps Supply Chain Professionals In Developing A Broader Perspective

Transparency Across The Value Chain Is Important For Faster Response

Thank You, Murphy For Making Our Supply Chains More Robust

Company Policies Often Come In The Way Of Faster Response

Replenishment Orders Are Often Understated

How Do You Make Your Supply Chain More Responsive?

How Should You Balance A Serial Production Line?

How Effective Is Your Exception Monitoring Process?

Are You Comfortable In Sharing Your KPIs With Consumers?

Do Supply Chains Suffer From Murphy’s Law?

Supply Chain Improvement Projects Yield Benefits With A Time Lag

Supply Chain Excellence Requires Managing By Exception

Why Should We Forecast Consumer Demand?

A Journey Of A Thousand Miles Begins With A Single Step

How Do You Break A Brick With Your Palm?

How do we internalize OTIF?

Are You Succeeding Too Often?

Is Your Supply Chain Designed For Concurrent Response To A Demand Shift?

Some Of Your Customers May Ask For Difficult Commitments

Customers Love Consistency Of Your Delivery

Constraints Are Useful

Would You Help Your Sales Team With A Disruptive Offering?

Is Your Quest For Perfection Delaying Certain Decisions?

Do We Need Segmentation In Supply Chain?

The Third Step Of A Change Management Effort Is The Key For Teams Buy-In

Resisting Change Is Like Holding Your Breath!

Does Your Supply Chain Focus Toggle Between Conflicting Priorities?

Can A System Operate Without Constraints?

When The Demand Patterns Change, Who Walks Away With The Additional Demand?

In Case Of A Sudden Demand Surge, Fast Response May Not Be Sufficient

How Do We Improve Flexibility In Logistics, Production And Procurement?

Are You Struggling With Too Many Initiatives?

Is Your Supply Chain Designed To Win At The Marketplace?

Agile Supply Chain Helps In Meeting Your Customers’ Ever Tightening Requirements

A Major Cause Of Supply Chain Issues Is The Rigidity In Forecasting

Tell-Tale Signs Of A Real Capacity Shortage Are Easy To Spot

Have You Identified The Right System Constraint?

What’s Holding You Back From Achieving More Of Your Goal?

Should We Motivate The Supply Chain Team For Excellence?

Excess Inventory Causing Stockouts?

What’s The Thread Connecting Your Integrated Planning Process?

Have You Created Inter-dependence With Your Supply Chain Partners?

Are You Leveraging The Power Of PDCA In Supply Chain Improvement?

How Much Inventory Should You Push Close To Consumers?

Do You Monitor Stockouts Over The Weekends As Well?

Are You Affected By The Shiny Object Syndrome?

Replenishment Process Creates Harmony Between Sales And Operations

How Quickly Can You Decipher A Shift In Demand Pattern?

MTS / MTO Classification Should Be Dynamic

Are We Managing The Current Chip Shortage As Per Toc Principles?

How Transparent Are Our Vendor Relations?

What’s Common In The Goals Of Your Supply Chain Team Members?

Production Scheduling Holds The Key To Product Availability And Freshness

Maharashtra’s Unlock Policy Is A Good Lesson In Segmentation

Do You Remember Little’s Law?

Are You Externalizing The Cause Of Supply Chain Underperformance?

People Are Good, Question The Process!

Believing Is Seeing!

Véjà Du - Open The Doors To Unlimited Improvements

Forecast Accuracy Continues To Be A Pain Point

Are You Visiting The Gemba Often?

Do You Encourage Multitasking?

How do we define product availability?

Are We Living With Compromises?

Flow Principles Would Help In Improving The Vaccination Experience

Problem Definition In Supply Chain Improvements Is Often Too Narrow

Rated Capacity Of An Equipment Is Often An Obstacle In Releasing More Capacity

Pharma Companies Should Improve Their Production Flexibility To Serve Better During The Pandemic

JIT In Supply Chain Works Only Under Certain Specific Conditions

Quality Is Not Free

Stepping Into Your Customers’ Shoes Is Often Sub-Optimal

Improvement Efforts Need To Be Directed And Targeted In Constraint Areas

Do You Face Occasional Shortage Of Components On Assembly Lines?

Why Is OTIF Such An Important Measure?

Quality Inspections Are Often Error Prone

Cutting Lead Times Actually Accelerates The Business

Improvement Is An Ongoing Process

Is Your Team Stressed At The Year End Today?

Do Demand Disruptions Cause Chaos In Your Supply Chain?

High Inventory Norms At CFAs Could Hamper The Service Level

Setup Times Can Be Reduced

Impact Of Adding Regional Warehouses On The Overall Inventory Is Positive

Good Supply Chain Solutions Look Simplistic ‘In Hindsight’

Do You Worry About Slips Between Supply Planning And Execution?

Are Your Freight Contracts Agile?

How Do You Measure Lost Sales?

Does Nature Buffer All Our Critical Requirements?

Does Nature Keep Inventory Buffers?

Convergence And Divergence Points Serve As Good Nodes For Inventory Buffer

Inventory Nodes In The Distribution Network Should Be Properly Defined To Get Agility Benefits

Inventory Compensates For Our Agility Gap

Frequency Of Execution Planning Is A Key Determinant Of Supply Chain Agility

Concept Of ‘Month’ Is Detrimental To Supply Chain Performance

‘Future Ready’ Initiatives Often Fail To Deliver The Intended Benefits

Focus On Functional Excellence Often Leads To Supply Chain Underperformance

‘Stockouts And Obsolescence Are Caused By Poor Forecast Accuracy’ Is An Erroneous Assumption

Erroneous Assumptions Can Make Your Supply Chain Look Very Complex

Supply Chain Transformation Is An Art

How Should We Implement Large Scale Supply Chain Transformation Projects?

There Are Two Distinct Needs To Improve Supply Chain Performance

Should We Improve Everything That Can Be Improved?

What Do Companies Do With The Rich Stream Of Data On Customer Orders?

Agile Supply Chains Help In Brand Building

Full Negative Impact Of Stockouts Is Rarely Understood

Lag Between Actual Demand Shift And The Requisite Supply Actions Is A Major Reason For Inventory Mismatch

Is Your Team Aligned On The Direction Of Solution?

Are You Settling For Mediocrity?

Demand Driven Supply Chains Also Experience Bullwhip Effect Due To Company’s Policies And Incentives

Bullwhip Effect Is Quite Prevalent In Most Supply Chains

Successful Supply Chain Transformation Projects Strive For Matching Employee Skills With The Technical And Process Skill Requirements

Demand Driven Supply Chains Help In Accelerating New Product Success

Demand Shaping Has Been Hyped, How About Supply Shaping?

Dashboards Should Be Actionable To Improve The Supply Chain Processes

Is Your Supply Chain Dashboard Too Cluttered?

Good News Travels Faster Than Bad News

Fast Feedback Loops Are Important To Control And Improve Supply Chains

We Need To Press The ‘Reset’ Button At Times For Major Supply Chain Paradigm Changes

How Do Your Conversations On Supply Chain Start?

Disruptions Are Good Opportunities To Make Our Supply Chains More Robust

Supply Chains Should Adapt To The Ever-changing Market...

IOT Will Help In Ensuring That Efficacy Of Covid 19...

Blockchain Technology Will Get Into The Mainstream With Covid 19 Vaccine Distribution

Implementing DDSC Solution Package Doesn’t Make A Company’s Supply Chain Demand Driven

Every Stockout Tells Us A Story

We Should Respect The Consumer Feedback

Cost Focus Can Be Detrimental To Your Business Profits

Frequency Of Planning Impacts Supply Chain Resilience

Supply Chain Problems Should Be Defined As Experienced By Consumers

SMED Must Be Internalized For Best Results

Extended Value Chains Should Be Designed For Harmony

Supply Chain Transformation Should Begin With Process Streamlining

Supply Chain Improvement Initiatives Should Be Simple...

Credit For Improvement In Customer Service Level Should Go To...

Supply Chain Improvements Should Move Us Closer To The Goal

Transparency Of Consumer Demand Helps In Building Resilience

Cost Benefit Analysis For Active Interventions In Supply

Supply Chains Are Getting A Lot Of Management Attention These Days

Copying Others’ Improvements Builds A Great Organizational Culture

Only A Few Supply Chain Improvement Models Are Sustainable

Quality Inspection Of Finished Goods Creates A Bottleneck...

EOQ Models Seem To Conflict With The Flow Principles

Most Factories Have Substantial Hidden Production Capacity

Frozen Period In Production Schedule Adversely Impacts Availability

Large Production Batches Negatively Affect Availability And Freshness

Weekly Closure Of Warehouses Disrupts Flow

Infrequent Supplies Could Potentially Cause Flow Disruption

Consumer Centric Supply Chains Focus On Flow Improvement

Supply Chains Need To Be Consumer Centric

Agile Supply Chains Thrive On Flexibility In Production

Optimisation Efforts In Supply Chains Are Mostly Sub-Optimal

Inventory Control Actions Are Often Misdirected

Synchronised Response Of The Entire Supply Chain Is Vital