Use a TMS for end to end transportation management capabilities
Every supply chain consists of not just the manufacturing and warehousing of products, but their
A lot of the time, supply chains and logistics processes within businesses aren’t strategically designed, and grow organically over time. They are rarely given due consideration and lack the scrutiny required to ensure that they operate as efficiently as possible.
Supply chain management is often chaotic and inefficient, partly because it is still poorly understood. Which is a surprise, because it contributes to a lot of the business input costs, and can drastically reduce them if inbound and outbound logistic processes are optimised. A lot of the time, supply chains and logistics processes within businesses aren’t strategically designed, and grow organically over time. They are rarely given due consideration and lack the scrutiny required to ensure that they operate as efficiently as possible. Fleetx likes to make sure that all aspects of your business run as efficiently as possible, and we hope this article can help you optimise inbound logistics processes to increase your profit margin and limit input costs.
Even though they are often used interchangeably, this is a good opportunity for us to distinguish between supply chain management and logistics, because it will make the content of this article more clear. Inbound and outbound logistics refers to getting the product from one point to another, while supply chain management refers to the entire process of moving the product from its original destination to the customer. To make it a little more concise, logistics refers to the movement of goods within one company, while supply chain management covers the movement of goods through different businesses in the supply chain.
Inbound logistics refers to the network that brings products or materials to your business. Your inbound logistics network includes everything you need to transport, store, and deliver goods to your business from other suppliers. The nature of the products that you bring into your business depends on the industry that you operate in. Inbound logistics can cover things like raw materials if you are a manufacturer, or finished products if you deal with assembly and distribution. To sum it up, inbound logistics includes everything your business needs to create the finished product that you eventually sell.
A majority of businesses spend most of their efforts on optimising their outbound logistics network (which is also important!) but fail to give the same amount of consideration to their inbound logistics network. And it’s surprising, because goods and products coming into your business take up a lot of time, labour and resources.
Optimising inbound logistics in your business can make a real impact, help you save money in a big way and streamline your operations. Your inbound logistics network consists of several variables, and these all have to be managed to achieve efficiency and accuracy. If your inbound logistics are badly planned, mismanaged or unreliable, your business will have to suffer the consequences!
Everyone is familiar with the phrase, ‘a penny saved is a penny earned’, and it is highly relevant to your inbound logistics processes. Inbound logistics is both incredibly complex and important, and experts consider it to be the final challenge to reducing transportation costs. Optimizing your inbound logistics network can help you streamline your business operations, and to achieve this, you must have a full picture of every moving part in the network and understand how the network functions.
For your inbound logistics network to operate as efficiently as possible, you have to optimize everything from receiving products to transporting those products to your facilities and distributing them. Streamlining this process is not easy and will require a considerable effort from supply chain managers and warehouse operators. To help you get started, we’ve compiled a list of activities you can engage in to optimise inbound logistics in your network.
We suggest using online routing guides because they are dynamic and can adapt to changes in the shipping landscape and give you the best deal when rates fluctuate. By implementing a routing guide, you can limit ad-hoc expenses put forward by suppliers. It can help establish rate benchmarks and eliminate the use of non-authorized carriers.
There are challenges associated with this, because consolidation can be a complex process. These are a few things to keep in mind if you decide to consolidate your shipments:
Optimising inbound logistics processes with appropriate technological solutions will help stay in control of your dynamic supply chain and improve your business operations. You will be able to access data on all of your shipments in one place, and enable analytics to guide the process. The power of inbound logistics software solutions can provide a great deal of insight into the decision-making process. It will help you identify gaps to improve efficiency, reduce overhead through cost analysis, and minimise material consumption and waste.
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