Westminster Business Case Study

Westminster Company is a giant Global manufacturer of health products whose brand has been recognized by the world. As the company they have three different operations which produce and distribute different product lines. Their main strategy on which they are working and which is a major success for them is decentralized management. Now they are re-evaluating their traditional supply chain strategy because the company is getting too much pressure from their large domestic’s customers and global customers. Now the company has to study on

Supply Chain Management: An International Journal, Volume 7, Number 5, 2002, pp. 271 – 282;

Supply chain management is a practice that involves the planning, supervision, and implementation of strategies and controls to direct the movement of goods and services provided to customers. The intent of this essay is to incorporate a synopsis of existing literature and to provide the reader with a general understanding of how supply chain management correlates with the organizational design and structure of modern firms. The essay comprehensively reviews the components of supply chain management and their integration with functional areas within an organization. The information presented in this essay

A supply chain is very important to an organization. It can and should show the relationship between suppliers, distributors, managers and consumers. This paper would detail how important suppliers and distributions are to an organization’s success. And how important a supply chain is within an organization and how managers can utilize the supply chain. It is important that companies such as Target Corporations utilize the supply chain and gain competitive advantages. Target is one of the world’s largest retail stores; the first Target was opened in 1962 in Roseville, Minnesota (Target.com). By the end of 1962 there were only four Target and they were all operated in Minnesota.

Numerous organisations have effectively executed supply chain ideas with terrific results. Proficient supply chains have empowered these firms to contend better. What were the purposes behind their triumphs? What were the obstacles these firms confronted in their excursions to accomplish joining in their systems? How were they ready to beat

Alex Coldfield, the VP of SCM, Westminster with team of high level managers has decided to improvise their supply chain capabilities to face these issues in a prominent way. They are analysing their customer composition and customer service requirements and align it more towards cost reduction. Alex also plans to implement three strategies to align the network redesign.

Timely knowledge regarding their supply chain helps the company in resolving the problem, which ultimately leads in attracting customers and gaining competitive advantage. It is observed that Tesco can easily get the competitive advantage by considering the element of collaboration at the time of formulating their strategies particularly regarding the supply chain activities for the reason that it would assist them to perform their activities in a more effective manner. However, it is a prior duty of the top officials of Tesco to encourage the collaboration technique in order to enhance the productivity and efficiency of their business operations to the utmost level. It is noticed that most of the large-scale organisations are quite keen to consider all possible measures through which they can easily enhance their business operations without any problem just because of the serious competition in the retail market. Furthermore, it is found that the Tesco supplier network and Supplier innovation group help the organisation to approach the right supplier for right place that ultimately improve their logistics operations and differentiate them from their competitors (Jaffeux & Wieser,

This case presents a company, known as Westminster and currently considered as one of the biggest manufacturer of health products. It consist of three separate companies, in which each of them manufactures their own and unique products, with a decentralized management that allows for an overall outside view of what is for best the future of this enterprise. Top managerial personnel is currently re-evaluating and assessing the company’s supply chain and how they could develop a strategies that would facilitate revamping such system.

Westminster Company has a long, rich tradition of being one of the biggest healthcare supply businesses in the world. They developed from a simple pharmacy supplier into an expanded, diverse variety of healthcare products to satisfy customer requirements. Westminster has operated in the United States (US) as three separate entities under one company that differ in location, size, and products produced. These three entities are individually operated and have no centralized management. In recent years, Westminster has observed the changing market and competition related to supply chains. In response, Westminster has conducted surveys and research over the past couple months that found some of the major issues that need to be addressed, to better serve their customers. As a result, they have sought solutions to adapt to these necessities in order to remain a solvent, competitive organization. The customers that make up the largest portion of sales (80/20 rule) are the mass merchants. These mass merchants are expected to continue growing during the upcoming decades. Therefore, it is imperative for Westminster Co. to ensure that they are able to properly serve the mass merchants’ requirements, while still being able to maintain customer requirements of non-mass merchants. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate Westminster’s current traditional supply chain practices and integrate solutions that will target efficient use of company resources while building stronger

Highly Effective Supply Chain: Woolworths and Coles efficient distribution network is both a resource and a capability in its in-bound and out-bound logistics. A culmination of tangible and intangible assets such as technological capabilities and supplier relationships, it is highly valuable as it was the significant cost- savings achieved throughout its entire logistics network that enabled Woolworths to achieve a higher EBIT over Coles (McKinna, 2009). The level of cost saving benefits provided is non-substitutable by any other resource. It is also difficult to imitate as the level and scope of the technological capabilities involved is highly specialized and staggering. However, should Woolworth’s possess an unfavorable public image or sell products undesirable to consumers, possessing an efficient distribution network would be

The strategies and the structures of the supply chains are amazing at some points. But there are shortcomings too. These major organizations have always tried to provide their customers with products of excellent quality. They have never compromised with the factor of customer satisfaction at any stage of the supply chain. Excellent professionalism and amazing business ethics have established iPhones and Dairy Milk as the leading products in their respective

Even in staple consumer goods, today 's environment is characterized by explosion of variety. How the company manages its supply chain in such settings influence business results and customer satisfaction.

Supply chains are an important factor in the running of a company. A lot of business decisions can be based on how well the supply chain is flowing. The relationship between different operations within a supply chain can have a huge impact on the way the chain works, depending on how well these relationships are managed. This is why companies try to practice good supply chain management. This essay is going to be looking at supply chains and analysing the way in which the relationship between the different operations can affect the way they work.

Supply chain management has become an important issue in today’s business world, it is used by many companies to improve their competitive advantage (Vickery, Calantone & Droge, 1999). In a supply chain, the customer is the most impart part and seeing that every company seeks to please their customers, supply chain management therefore helps companies in satisfying the needs of the customer which involves the management of various aspects such as manufacturing, suppliers, transportation, information and retailers to deliver value to the customers (Chopra & Meindl, 2007).

Supply chain management (SCM) is based on the philosophy that firms operating in a supply chain are oriented to the provision of goods and services for the ‘final customer’ (Lambert and Cooper, 2000) . The literature strongly suggests that that cohesive collaboration in the supply chain can provide important benefits such as added value, efficiencies and client satisfaction (Stock, Boyer and Harmon,