Businesses need many qualities to succeed in today's global market, but agility, consistency, and flexibility are the most critical. Strong organizations leverage these qualities to capitalize on the economic benefits of worldwide sourcing and distribution, while satisfying their customers' needs -- whether the customer is around the corner or across the sea.
Top notch 3PLs share the same traits. They have a global footprint, with one-stop solutions that touch every component of the supply chain. They focus on reliable service execution, mindful that today's lean manufacturing processes rely on consistently meeting shippers' time-definite demands.
They are agile, using insight and foresight within an origin market to make proactive, positive decisions on behalf of their clients.
And they are flexible, recognizing the dynamic and global nature of their customers' supply and distribution networks.
Offshoring Impact
The value of 3PLs has intensified recently because of the increase in offshoring. This creates robust sources of supply, and opens up new avenues of distribution, as emerging markets gain wealth and buying power.
For now, offshoring's impact is specifically felt on inbound trade to the United States; by some estimates, U.S. import volumes in 2005 will be 8 percent to 10 percent greater than 2004's robust levels, with no end in sight.
But offshoring is not without risk to the supply chain. As the chain stretches further and further from production source, to market consumption, meeting or exceeding a customer's expectations (reliably and cost-effectively) becomes a huge challenge.
Without a well-conceived plan, organization's offshoring production to far-off locales may discover that the cost of shipping, customs clearance, inventory financing, security, and warehousing -- not to mention ill will from customers if delivery performance suffers -- erases the savings that drove them to offshore.
Recognizing these hazards, savvy manufacturers have diversified their supply networks and developed multiple production and distribution points to serve their end markets.
Companies manufacturing U.S.-bound products ,with variable demand and relatively moderate value, for example, can source in North America or Latin America, position products in domestic distribution centers, and deliver them, on-demand, via low-cost surface transport.
This strategy helps companies avoid the expenses, service disruptions, and delivery delays that can occur when goods move halfway across the globe and through congested U.S. ports. It also allows companies to react quickly to changes in demand in the U.S. market.
The appeal of producing in China or India, therefore, must be balanced against the time and complexity required to deliver finished goods across thousands of miles.
Global Challenges
As today's businesses expand their global supply and distribution channels, the scope and ability of a logistics provider's infrastructure takes on paramount importance. Helping shippers optimize inventory value, by accelerating distribution accuracy and velocity, while also consistently meeting the ultimate customer's delivery demands, are the dual objectives of global 3PLs.
So say, that the 21st Century company has become enormously productive and efficient, as the secular decline in inventory-to-sales ratio shows. Yet the absolute dollar value of inventory continues to climb, as a result of the escalating value of goods.
Twenty years ago, for example, the typewriter and telex were the office machines of choice. Today, it is the laptop computer, which retails for three to five times their cost. This translates into rising inventory carrying costs, which can be exacerbated by elongated supply chains that can accelerate product obsolescence and erode value.
Unless the trend is reversed, the cost to carry and warehouse inventory will consume 70 percent of total logistics expenses by the end of the decade, according to some estimates. To overcome this challenge, 3PLs' physical and IT networks must be more than mere transport facilitators. In fact, the mode and cost of transport is often irrelevant.
Ensuring satisfaction for shippers and their customers through rising service expectations is central to the 3PL value proposition. Delivering this satisfaction means offering near-perfect fulfillment rates and precisely timed deliveries supported by full pipeline visibility -- while also minimizing inventory glut and bloat.
3PL infrastructures must be aligned to move in concert with the shipper's needs. Not every product will have "made in China" stamped on it; businesses will produce and distribute to, from, and on every continent in the future (and for the most part, in the here-and-now).
Ultimately, consignee demands, product value, shifting tariff structures, and logistics partners' ability to reliably hit time-definite delivery benchmarks regardless of distance will dictate supply chain strategy and execution. Logistics providers' networks must reflect those realities.
To 3PL or Not to 3PLAs commerce extends in reach and complexity, businesses will look for partners that can deliver flexibility as well as goods. Asset-neutral providers, with a wide array of transport services at their disposal, possess powerful competitive tools. They can often strike the optimum balance between price, transit time, and capacity.
And they have the capabilities to expertly manage product and information flow from purchase order to point-of-purchase (yes, my acronym - PO to PoP once again), all through a single point of contact. Asset-based providers' "closed-loop" infrastructures, while formidable in many respects, may not be suitable for all transactions because the flow of goods must fit within their predetermined schedules.
Logistics companies come in all shapes and sizes. The best ones, however, share the common strengths of agility, consistency, and flexibility. Providing proper supply chain management requires meeting delivery targets and reducing costs. A 3PL must strive to align itself with their client, and their client's market(s) of choice.
But only when 3PLs fully understand their customers' business model can they provide and execute the best possible solutions. This must be done by actively listening, sense and respond to the origin and destination market's needs, and ultimately creating a process to meet the customer's challenge.
The purpose of any automatic identification and data collection (AIDC) system is to provide a quick and accurate way to enter data into an IT system. But the old maxim, garbage in, garbage out still applies. Without a consistent means to represent data within a bar code, RFID tag, XML, or other form of data exchange, there's no check on the quality of the data entering the system. IE; technology for technology's sake is a load of wasted time and money!
