Making customers the base of your Supply Chain
With economy still struggling through recessionary times, companies are under increased pressure to maintain their levels of customer satisfaction through better services, reduce delivery lead times along with reducing their inventory costs at the same time.
These days the best supply chains are the ones which “start with the Customer and end with the Customer.” Not to argue that customers are the base, the heart and soul of every business without which all business activities are futile. Here are some tips to make your supply chain management more and more customer centric:
Product Design
The products manufactured should be reliable, cost effective with minimum possible manufacturing time. In addition, they should be flexible enough to be used in multiple applications at your Customer location(s).
Demand Management
Forecast demand with accuracy, prioritize Customers based on their strategic importance to your business, project sales levels, and then maintain optimal lot sizes for yourself and your Customer.
Order Management
Try to reduce order entry and order processing times, minimize agreed-upon order-to-receipt lead times and manage order fill within stated capacity allocations. In order to ensure timely shipment of your products, expediently resolve letter of credit, export compliance and other issues which could hinder your shipment process.
Logistics
Agree on transportation routings and costs ahead of time and understand any particular import/export regulations that may hold up delivery of international shipments.
Besides these aspects that deal more directly with the Customer, there are other integral elements of supply chain management that need to be addressed for success of the business, viz., Production planning, Master production scheduling, Shop floor control, Quality assurance, Cycle time reduction, Inventory planning, etc.
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