Analysis of Supply Chain in Reliance Fresh Retail

The global supply chain in the retail industry has witnessed changes and shifts which have led to opportunities and challenges for the involved players. This has occasioned shifts in trade and consumer behavior patterns. Among these are global growth patterns brought about by explosion of more cities and thus growth in infrastructure. There have been flexible supply chain trends which have enabled retail operators to adapt effectively to unexpected circumstances and changes. Moreover, globalization has changed the way retail supply chain is managed as more mature markets emerge to provide logistic and standard solution needs of the businesses. Conversely, near-shoring has

Westminster Company is one of the largest manufacturers of consumer health products, based in US. Their distinctive name and company logo are recognized throughout the world. Westminster was originally founded as a family-owned pharmaceutical supply business in 1923, the company has expanded, by virtue of aggressive new product development, into a global provider of health care consumer products. It consumes three wholly owned subsidiaries, manufacturing grocery product, drugs, and mass merchandise. Intense rivalry in the market, and distresses of having an effective supply chain, made the company evaluate its supply chain and logistics. The primary focus of its research was the key clients of the three companies. To understand logistics the company must first know what logistics is and how it works. Logistics is defined as a business planning framework for the management of material, service, information and capital flows (Logistics World , 2014). Logistics is an important function of the business and without a proper logistics system, all the manufacturing, marketing and other activities would fail, overall resulting with the company failing to reach its full potential. After thoroughly analyzing the case study of, Westminster Company, to improve their current logistic strategy, they would need to implement the following strategies: developing and analyzing a new system to focus on strategic effort to ship their products in a timelier, efficient and in a more accurate

Supply chain is one of the critical aspects that can make or break any company. The research will also concentrate on aspects of supply chain.

Logistics refers to all the processes involved in storing, moving, transporting or in any other way handling material. Role of logistics in activities before start of material and after completion of manufacture up to transportation to the immediate customer has been well recognized in the past also. But the logistics cost and effectiveness is also affected by, and in turn affect all other activities along the supply chain.

This dissertation is submitted in part fulfillment of the requirements for the CILT Diploma in Logistics and Supply Chain Management.

In today’s world, competence is taking on new dimensions. The ability to compete is being determined by the degree of responsiveness to customers & key issues handling. How fast you deliver the goods/ products, what the price paid by customers & what value customer is getting throughout the service is considered in a schematic & ordered way. Markets are quick demanding & customization of each logistics activities is essential for each customer, & has become the essential factor in logistics management.

CRANFIELD UNIVERSITY CRANFIELD SCHOOL OF MANAGEMENT CRANFIELD CENTRE FOR LOGISTICS & SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT MSc THESIS

Many companies have always viewed logistics as only a transport cost solution. Though transportation cost represent a huge expenditure for production companies, inventory management has the ability to significantly improve a company’s performance and reduce costs greatly.

Today global retailers are managing thousands of vendors and potential millions of individual customer across the world through efficient supply chain network. With worldwide sourcing, diverse merchandise and varied selling formats, supply chain is becoming complex every day. Retailers are wishing to take position in fast moving hugely competitive market must find the right supply chain solutions that will able them to deliver their products to customer at right place and a right time. Retailers always aim for broader product variety , best profitable selling price and lower cost (Hubner and Kuhn, 2012) and are growing vertically by encompassing more logistical functions (Fernie et al., 2010). In this volatile economic environment, retail industries are experiencing with some supply chain issues such as complexity in supply chain network, less practice of effective CSR, waste management, technology upturns and sustainable supply issue etc. These issues are being considering solemnly in order to bring more efficiency in supply chain. Because of inability to get the right products to right place at right time, retailers still losing big amount of revenue though they heavy invested on IT.( e.g. Friend and Walker, 2001; Gruen et al., 2002)

Logistics can be defined as that significant element of the supply chain routine that is involved in planning, controlling and further implementing the flow of goods and storage services, and other necessary activities from the point of inception to the point of final delivery for providing the customers’ maximum satisfaction. For the success of any organization, proper logistics management is a must.

It is known to us, “in each industry, the customer is god, is operator's food and clothing parents.” This tells us that customers are important to organizations. With the current intense competition in logistics nowadays, most companies can provide high quality goods, even are willing to cut down prices if reasonable. However, how can suppliers gain a competitive advantage when high quality is expected and price must be maintained at a level to generate a reasonable return? In our views, it is no doubt that how various supplier service activities are valued by customers, more specifically, that is, the ability of logistics

Supply Chain Management seeks to guarantee that “merchandise is produced and distributed at the right quantities, to the right locations, and at the right time. . .” (Stock, Boyer, & Harmon, 2010). It is the management of a company’s supply chain by coordination and integration of the multitude of supply chain partners that a company interacts with. Initially, the concept focused on how to make a relationship between supplier and purchaser more efficient but has now been broadened to include the management of many activities, functions, and organizations. In some industries it may include a company’s entire supply chain, including all of its customers, suppliers, and strategic partners (du Toit & Vlok, 2014; Walker & Jones, 2012). The concept has expanded so far today that many argue that there is no longer any competition among individual companies but instead competition among separate supply chains (Brun & Moretto, 2012).

The concept of logistics has evolved over time in response to factors such as changes in the business environment. Grunnet (1996, p.32) notes that the focus was inventories in the 1950s, distribution in the 1960s, production in the 1970s, purchasing/production/sales in the 1980s, and business process in the 1990s. Logistics can be defined as that part of the supply chain process that plans, implements, and controls the efficient, effective flow and storage of goods, services, and related information from the point of origin to the point of consumption in order to meet customer’s requirements.

In the Indian scenario, with relatively less importance given to efficient logistics, the market leaders in beverage industry like Coca Cola, PepsiCo and Parlé Agro have their own well established strong logistics network. The other small scale industries producing both carbonated and non-carbonated soft drinks in glass/ PET bottles or in Tetra Pak cartons have a comparatively well established third-party logistics system. They have the help of local providers in providing vehicles for small transfers which help them in overcoming problems such as demands for bribes by retailers, security and other logistics

Organized retailing (OZR) is one of most promising industry in India. The OZR sector of India is now among top five fastest growing markets of world. High population, globalization, and increasing the middle man income etc. are the number of factors that makes Indian market more challenging and competitive, regularly. In today’s globalized world, efficient supply chain performance (SCP) is highly important to ensure the efficiency in whole supply chain (SC). In this paper, we investigated the factor that affect cold supply chain performance (CSCP) of organized farm products retailing (OFPR) and developed and validate the model. This research shall be helpful to formulate better strategies for this sector.