To ensure that you maintain a manageable warehouse and deliver on time, every time, you can take three easy steps. Here’s how.
Have you reached a stage in your logistics business where the warehouses are overflowing with stock, and your clients’ customers aren’t receiving goods on time, again and again? A number of businesses in your sector face this challenge, including powerhouses like Imperial Logistics.
To overcome its stock control issues, and to ensure its clients, and its clients’ clients, are kept content, Imperial Logistics took a tactical approach to improve its operations.
It established Best Practices, combined these with tech solutions to improve ‘visibility’, and finally, it decided to leverage off the expertise and capabilities of others. If you don’t make changes to better manage your end-to-end supply chain solution, you’ll find it harder to turn a profit going forward.
Take Note
In order to improve your management capabilities, you’ll need to consider investing in digital technologies that are tailored to your business’s exact needs. Engaging with ITC service providers is a good place to start when assessing your capabilities. By speaking to tech experts, you’ll be able to spend money on essential solutions, rather than things that hinder your logistics processes further.
While Imperial Logistics may be a multi-national, with truckloads of cash to spare, when it comes to investing in infrastructure, technology, and systems and processes, you can do exactly what Imperial Logistics did raise its game. Here’s how they did it, and you can too:
Step 1 – Establish Best Practices
In order to improve your stock control, and deliver on time, you’ll need to appoint a single point of contact per client. This is particularly important when dealing with larger customers that have a number of product skews. Imperial Logistics was challenged when it scored a contract to deliver eye care products for Bausch & Lomb.
The eye care specialists had so many skews, and so many products, that Imperial Logistics had no choice but to appoint a key account manager on the project. By appointing a key account manager and establishing internal processes (Best Practices), repeatable steps to take when things go right or wrong, you’ll be in a better position to manage stock and improve your profitability.
Step 2 – Continuously improve ‘visibility’
Visibility seems like a buzzword that’s been bandied about a lot in recent years, however, it’s more than just a trend. To improve your visibility, you’ll need to invest in digital technologies that enable your employees to have succinct insights on every single aspect of your operation. For instance, Imperial Logistics invested in its ITC infrastructure under the guidance of SAP.
A digitally-enhanced receiving process, using barcoded scanners that speak to software, enabled the company to save time and money. On top of this, it invested in radio frequency (RF) devices that could identify full batch and serial numbers, to ensure that the right products were leaving the warehouse.
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Have you reached a stage in your logistics business where the warehouses are overflowing with stock, and your clients’ customers aren’t receiving goods on time, again and again? A number of businesses in your sector face this challenge, including powerhouses like Imperial Logistics.
To overcome its stock control issues, and to ensure its clients, and its clients’ clients, are kept content, Imperial Logistics took a tactical approach to improve its operations.
It established Best Practices, combined these with tech solutions to improve ‘visibility’, and finally, it decided to leverage off the expertise and capabilities of others. If you don’t make changes to better manage your end-to-end supply chain solution, you’ll find it harder to turn a profit going forward.
Related: Supply chain management for business growth
TAKE NOTE
In order to improve your management capabilities, you’ll need to consider investing in digital technologies that are tailored to your business’s exact needs. Engaging with ITC service providers is a good place to start when assessing your capabilities. By speaking to tech experts, you’ll be able to spend money on essential solutions, rather than things that hinder your logistics processes further.
Transport -and -logistics -supply -chain -management
While Imperial Logistics may be a multi-national, with truckloads of cash to spare, when it comes to investing in infrastructure, technology, and systems and processes, you can do exactly what Imperial Logistics did raise its game. Here’s how they did it, and you can too:
Step 1 – Establish Best Practices
In order to improve your stock control, and deliver on time, you’ll need to appoint a single point of contact per client. This is particularly important when dealing with larger customers that have a number of product skews. Imperial Logistics was challenged when it scored a contract to deliver eye care products for Bausch & Lomb.
The eye care specialists had so many skews, and so many products, that Imperial Logistics had no choice but to appoint a key account manager on the project. By appointing a key account manager and establishing internal processes (Best Practices), repeatable steps to take when things go right or wrong, you’ll be in a better position to manage stock and improve your profitability.
Step 2 – Continuously improve ‘visibility’
Visibility seems like a buzzword that’s been bandied about a lot in recent years, however, it’s more than just a trend. To improve your visibility, you’ll need to invest in digital technologies that enable your employees to have succinct insights on every single aspect of your operation. For instance, Imperial Logistics invested in its ITC infrastructure under the guidance of SAP.
A digitally-enhanced receiving process, using barcoded scanners that speak to software, enabled the company to save time and money. On top of this, it invested in radio frequency (RF) devices that could identify full batch and serial numbers, to ensure that the right products were leaving the warehouse.
Related: 10 supply chain trends
Step 3 – Leverage the capabilities of others
While you may have the truck and driver capability to deliver the goods you’ve committed to transport, it may make sense to outsource some of your work to fellow transporters.
Imperial Logistics had to make twice-daily deliveries in Gauteng, which required intricate scheduling. The conglomerate decided to bring on Mercury Couriers as a preferred transport supplier, to ensure it delivered on time, every time.
The way Imperial Logistics made this process seamless, was by integrating Mercury Couriers into its electronic resource planning (ERP) system. It did take a little time (three weeks to be exact), but in the end it enabled Imperial Logistics to maintain full traceability of consignments from warehouse to customer.
Maintaining a well organised warehouse is essential if you intend on hitting those revenue targets, but more importantly its vital to ensure profitability. Establishing Best Practices, improving visibility within the company and bringing on fellow businesses to assist where necessary can enable your business to thrive well into the future.
Over the past 25 years, Dovetail Business Solutions have established themselves to be industry leaders in the world of Logistics as well as through leaders. Read More Articles Now