Archive for November, 2010

Are Reverse Auctions Strategic? YES THEY ARE!!!!!!!

Thursday, November 4th, 2010

What is strategic is entirely up to the person using the tool, whether or not they have used it before and if it returns the results they require as part of their strategic plan. So can a reverse auction be strategic. Of course it can. The overlying strategy might in fact be to simply get costs under control as quickly as possible. I shudder to think that this would be a company?s entire strategy, but in these times of economic survival it may well be. I can envision the following. The economy is kicking a companies ass and the CEO calls a? staff meeting and says we have a new strategy and for the time being everything else will take a back seat in order to get our costs down. Come back in a week and tell you how you are going to do this immediately.

Now for the English lesson.

The word strategy is a noun that has several definitions. According to Wiktionary, 2 of those are.

1.?A plan of action intended to accomplish a specific goal
2.?The art of using similar techniques in politics or business

The word strategic is an adjective which we know is a word that modifies a noun and can also me modified by an adverb. So think of strategic as meaning of and pertaining to strategy and can be used comparatively as in something that is more strategic or less strategic.

So can a reverse auction or auctions be strategic. Of course they can and one example would be if your strategy was to simply reduce costs immediately. They can also be more strategic as part of a going forward strategy as well as provide other strategic benefits such as cleaning up your specifications and reporting as well as providing new sources of supply.

We look forward to and appreciate your comments.

Air shipments are growing. How concerned should retailers be about Air Cargo safety?

Wednesday, November 3rd, 2010

There are many?areas that effect air cargo prices that can effect demand for and the use of this service and there are literally hundreds of airlines that participate. Examples might be issues such as the ash plumes from Iceland to the cost of jet fuel. With the recent concerns relative to air cargo security driven by the events in Yemen it is critically important not only that governments be concerned about the safe shipment of cargo to the? U.S.; but that U.S. companies importing these good also be concerned once the products have crossed our borders and entered the ground stage of their delivery cycle. The more products that are shipped the larger the problem for governments and? retail companies.

Air cargo volumes are growing rapidly. According to an article in Reuters the International Air Transport Association or the IATA says that the United States, for instance, shipped around 30 percent of its exports by value using air transport from January to March, IATA estimated. According to another article in Business Insider by Vincent Fernando, CFA titled Hong Kong Air Cargo Volume Exploding towards Record Highs. The article goes on to say that someone forget to tell Hong Kong the global economy was in trouble. Air Cargo volume is surging for the trade hub, up 47% year over year, and at the highest level in two and a half years.

Employees, consumers want to know that they are safe. As such it is critical that companies work together to develop a process that insures check and balances are in place from the site of original shipment to final store or consumer delivery.

We look forward to and appreciate your comments

Here are nine steps to safer and more eco-friendly procurement.

Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010

Below are nine? great steps to? follow in order to drive safer and more eco-friendly procurement.

1.?Be pro-active in driving not for resale and for resale product safety within your company, and also supporting eco-standards in the procurement process.
2.?Pay it forward with all of your trading partners by sharing what you are doing, and asking what they do to support yours or similar initiatives.
3.?Educate your employees and trading partners about common safety standards and guidelines such as the SQF Certificate www.sqfi.com? and the Global Food Safety Initiative www.ciesnet.com.
4.?Educate your employees and trading partners about common eco-standards such as Green- Energy National Standard www.green-e.org or EcoLogo www.ecologo.org.?
5.?Point associates and trading partners to free educational websites such as www.safesourcing.com to use their free SafeSourcing Wiki or the Sourcebook professional social network for procurement professionals.
6.?Only use trading partners that follow your lead.
7.?Train your team to understand and use all available tools that insure supply chain safety such the free daily safety in sourcing blog at www.safesourcing.com? or the low cost SafeSourceIt Supplier Database and Reverse Auction Tools.
8.?Impose a system of measures and controls to monitor performance against clearly defined goals.
9.?Start at the top and engage all levels of your company.

We appreciate and look forward to your comments.

How safe is your/our supply chain? Help keep us all safe please.

Monday, November 1st, 2010

The specific question is how safe is your supply chain. How safe is it when transporting r products to your stores from warehouses all over the country and in fact all over the globe. Are there enough checks and balances in place to insure that the only products on a boat, train, truck or jet are the products that should be there?

The recent threats from Yemen should make all supply chain logistics providers ask the same questions every time something ships relative to their own and 3rd party logistics providers they may provide these shipping and delivery services. Unfortunately most companies will not have an answer readily available on this subject. In fact most companies will tell you when they order something how soon they would like to receive it and where but will never ask how the product will get there and by whom.

It?s crazy to think that we don?t know what?s on a plane until four hours before it gets to the U.S. This according to an article in the Arizona Republic titled Yemeni arrested in mailing of powerful bombs by Eileen Sullivan and Ahmed Al-Haj of the Associated Press. We have to do better. The terrorist never rest and we must remain diligent. So think about where you products come from and how they get from their point of origin to your stores. This is part of having a traceable supply chain but in this case we need to know what is shipping, when it?s shipping and who has access to to it during the entire process.

We look forward to and appreciate your comments.