A company of national renown in retail that has more than 150 stores across Canada. These stores receive daily shipments from distribution facilities located in Ontario and British Columbia.
Challenge
Customer wants to review its national logistics network to identify cost reduction and performance improvement opportunities.
Approach
Using existing studies and SAP data and obtaining cost estimates and quotes from selected vendors, provide analytical support to create and analyse decision models towards selecting the optimal supply chain and logistic network for the customer.
The logistic network changes to be investigated are, but not limited to: size and location (including China) of distribution facilities, use of 3PLs for its retail and eCommerce activities and inbound and outbound freight models, including postponement techniques, skip-zone and LTL/parcel delivery modes.
The model creation and analysis support included:
- Build data requirement for the distribution and freight services
- Prepare RFP/RFQs, issue and collect respondent information
- Build a decision model to analyze the network reengineering scenario
- Analyze strategic network sourcing by using many transportation modes – boat, truck (FTL, LTL)
- Comparing scenarios for cost saving by keeping inventory in Canada or China
Outcome
The mandate resulted in the identification of a 20% costs reduction opportunity with no loss of service performance. The customer is now acting upon the recommendations.
