A Comprehensive Warehouse Safety Guide!

When it comes to the state of working in America, warehouses have seen a huge increase of workers with over 1,000,000 total since the start of 2018. With this trend looking to continue into the next couple of years, it’s time to examine the state of the industry, especially when it comes to safety with all of these new employees entering the field.

Warehouses, often full of moving machinery carrying heavy loads, are inherently one of the most dangerous places to work. If you’re a warehouse manager, failing to control these risks can lead to high employee turnover, decreased productivity, legal issues, and, at worst, injury or fatality.

In most case scenarios, the law requires companies to train their workers for a CPR certificate to improve workplace safety practices.

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The Baby Supply Chain!

We have a newborn Grandson!  A beautiful baby boy!

Aside from being a parent there is no better feeling than being a Grandparent!

A whole new world of joy and responsibility has begun for my son and his girlfriend.  It is such an exciting time but their routine will be completely turned upside down as new parents.

They will have to figure out so many things that they never had to deal with before.  Parents immediately  have to care for their child in every way.

They have also just entered the world of the Baby Supply Chain!

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Augmented Reality (AR) is the Future of Supply Chain!

Augmented Reality (AR) enables transformational change!

When I started in the distribution space, I was told “…business is simple…cases in, cases out.” Reports were on green bar paper and forklifts were everywhere. As the distribution space evolved, the reports became spreadsheets and forklifts remained very important as they are coupled with the latest and greatest automation.

Supply chain improvements over the last 15 years have been incremental at best. The advances we are making in the supply chain powered by Augmented Reality (AR) are going to be wildly disruptive. The supply chain community that leans into AR and gets it right will come out the clear winners for every perspective: simplicity, safety, quality and productivity.

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Crowdfunding Fulfillment Solutions: Things You Should Know About

Crowdfunding has given entrepreneurs and inventors greater access to startup capital. You might not be able to get seed money or Series A funding from a venture capital firm for your idea, but backers on Kickstarter or Indiegogo could give you just the leg up that you need.

Crowdfunding marketing is a strategy to raise funds for a project by asking a large number of people to donate money, usually in small amounts to fulfill the financial goals of the project. Crowdfunding, on the other hand, gives you a quick place to showcase and share your pitch with a bigger audience.

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Turn your Brick And Mortar Stores into E-Commerce Distribution Hubs!

Retailers with Brick and Mortar stores continue to be under tremendous pressure.  Competition is intense in the fast growing Omnichannel E-Commerce world.  Every week there seems to be news about how one Retailer or another is closing more of their stores when they could be using them as Distribution hubs.

And very few Retailers with Brick And Mortar stores have been able to make a profit in E-Commerce.  Competitors who only sell online without physical stores appear to have an advantage with lower overhead costs.

So how can Brick And Mortar Retailers turn their stores into a competitive advantage plus a source of greater profitability?

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Cutting out the Middleman: The Growth of Direct to Consumer!

As supply chains evolve and grow, products are often passed between dozens of hands at factories, shipping vehicles and pallets, distributor warehouses, retail warehouses, shop floors, and delivery fleets. They often travel thousands of miles to go direct to consumer.

And they go through multiple intermediaries, something which has an impact not only on the profit margins, but also on the brand’s ability to connect and communicate with their customer.

With revenue growth remaining a challenge, almost half (48 per cent) of manufacturers are racing to build Direct to Consumer (DTC) channels, with almost all of them (87 per cent) seeing these channels as relevant to their products and consumers.

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Our 2018 Top 10 List (Part 2)!

As 2018 comes to a close we offer a list of the Top 10 most viewed articles that we have published over the last half of the year.

When you look at this list you will see that there is a common theme amongst most of the articles.  That theme is one of “Definitions”.

Based upon tremendous viewer interest this year we began our “What Exactly Is … ” article series to describe definitions and commentary on terms which we often see and hear but don’t always truly understand.

For instance, the term “Supply Chain Management” itself has innumerable definitions and our article What Exactly Is Supply Chain Management? 10 Different Definitions! proved to be one of our most popular articles ever.

So here it is, our Top 10 list for the second half of 2018!

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The Ultimate Guide to Pick and Pack Methods!

A lot more goes into successful order fulfillment than shelves of neatly stacked products. There is an art and a science to pick and pack methods.

Good inventory management and the right pick and pack software will help you ship orders with maximum speed and accuracy.

Here is your ultimate guide to pick and pack methods.

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Warehouse Efficiency Improvement Tips!

Things can always be faster when you work in a warehouse or distribution center. Speed has become the name of the game when it comes to staying competitive in the global supply chain.

Major players like Amazon and Walmart have distribution centers all over the world, pumping out packages at lightning speed.

If you want to keep your customers satisfied, you need to keep things moving in your warehouse or distribution center. Use these tips to keep up the pace and make your facility as efficient as possible.

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What’s the Difference Between Fulfillment and Replenishment?

People who do not work in Supply Chain may hear the terms Fulfillment and Replenishment and consider that they mean the same thing.

Interestingly many people who do work in Supply Chain consider the terms Fulfillment and Replenishment to be synonymous.

I have worked in many different industries and all around the world but the place where I heard these terms used most frequently was in Retail.

Given that there is some ambiguity in the understanding of these terms it makes sense to provide the distinction.

What is the difference between Fulfillment and Replenishment?

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Keys to Success in Warehouse Management/Order Fulfillment! (Video)

E-Commerce continues to be the fastest growing sales channel anywhere in the world.  E-Commerce globally has been growing at over 20% per year and will continue to grow at that rate for the next several years.  (Source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/288487/forecast-of-global-b2c-e-commerce-growt/  )

With these ever-increasing order volumes and changes in online shopper expectations there is enormous pressure on E-Commerce company Supply Chain distribution and fulfillment operations.

What are the keys for E-Commerce companies to be successful in fulfilling all of these orders and demands from online consumers?

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Breaking your Supply Chain Traffic Jam!

Does anyone like being stuck in a Traffic Jam?

Prior to one Holiday season several years ago the volume that was coming into the Distribution Centre receiving area was unprecedented and unpredicted.   We were out of room on the docks and we were out of storage space but trucks kept on coming.  And we were still weeks away from being able to ship product to stores to relieve the pressure.

We were gridlocked.  We kept inching our way along but we were very, very close to having this traffic jam of activity shut us down.

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6 Technologies that will Change Transportation and Trucking Forever!

Modern transportation and trucking is currently experiencing major changes thanks to transformative transportation technologies. Although we’ve become accustomed to long international flights, jam-packed public transportation and diesel trucks that only get 20 mpg, the future of transportation promises to change all of that and much more — and it’s closer than many people realize.

Let’s take a look at 6 transportation technologies sure to impact the trucking and transportation industries forever.

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Streamline your Entire Distribution Centre or Warehouse at One Time!

How many times have you looked at your Distribution Centre operation and thought about how you would re-layout and streamline the process flow if you had the chance?

When you are starting with a new, empty facility it is clearly much easier to layout the operations to make the best possible flow of materials and processes.  But when you have an existing operation which has evolved over a long period of time, you are likely faced with utilities, equipment, infrastructure, walls, and paradigms all of which have resulted in a rather inefficient flow of materials and people and processes.

This was the situation we had in one of our Distribution Centres. In this particular Distribution Centre the current layout of the operation had been the result of many iterations of adding new customers, new products and new processes over time with the associated fluctuations in demand for everything.

Yet with the launch of our Global Process Excellence project we had unleashed our employees to make the improvements they had imagined could be made for a long time.

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Seasoned Leadership in Action™! An Interview with Paul Kretz, Head of SCM at Church & Dwight!

Paul Kretz
Paul Kretz, SCM at Church & Dwight

At Supply Chain Game Changer we believe in sharing experiences and expertise from people in every industry and from across the globe.  As such we have introduced our “Seasoned Leadership in Action™” Interview series at Supply Chain Game Changer.  This interview is with Paul Kretz, Head of SCM at Church and Dwight.

I first met Paul at Celestica.  He left to purse other interests but our paths crossed again later on.  I was at a company that had just implemented a new WMS system in the Distribution Centre.  The system cutover  was a disaster.  And the operation had been run without true Warehouse Management experience as well.  As I looked to recruit a new leader I was looking for a someone who could lead change.

I toured my final two candidates through the Distribution Centre, including Paul.  Their reactions would help me decide who to select.  The other person seemed overwhelmed and lost while looking at the mess in the warehouse.  It wasn’t clear what they would do.  Paul looked at the disastrous situation like a kid in a candy store.  He saw opportunity at every turn.  And instead of  being intimidated by the situation Paul was motivated and inspired.  I found my leader!

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