T. Boone Pickens to keynote Annual Global Conference
Is your supply chain being held captive by the price of oil? Can natural gas help? The iconic energy executive T. Boone Pickens thinks so.
Pickens and Clean Energy CEO Andrew Littlefair will kick off CSCMP's Annual Global Conference (September 30 to October 3 in Atlanta, Georgia, USA) by looking at the current state of global energy supply, America's oil crisis, and how domestic natural gas could replace diesel and gasoline, bringing competitiveness and prosperity for the trucking industry.
The conference's closing presentation will feature motivational speaker Erik Wahl's creative and entertaining presentation, "The Art of Vision." Wahl will show how breakthrough thinking leads to extraordinary results and will identify ways to utilize unconventional wisdom to build a strategic vision for the future.
In addition to the opening and closing keynotes, the conference will include educational sessions, roundtable discussions, exhibits, networking opportunities, and distribution facility tours. For example, the 24 educational session tracks will cover a wide range of topics, such as managing innovation in technology, supply chain ideas that changed the world, talent and leadership, and how to manage capital-intensive supply chains, to name just a few.
Other special events include the 2012 Educators Conference, the Supply Chain of the Future exhibition, and full-day, pre-conference workshops. The four workshops will include: Building and Maintaining Business Relationships; Leveraging Supply Chain Management for Enterprise Development; Supply Chain Risk Mitigation; and The "New" Fundamentals of Supply Chain Management: What Matters Now.
A new offering this year is the "Women at Work Panel: Power Up Your Supply Chain Management Career," a fresh and honest perspective on the challenges facing women in today's corporate supply chain environment and how to overcome them. Speakers will discuss how women's roles, relationships, and responsibilities have changed in the field, and the skills women need to transition into leadership positions.
For the first time, CSCMP is offering discounted registration rates to active, retired, and civilian U.S. military personnel. Additionally, 10 percent of the proceeds from military registrations will go to the "Wounded Warrior Project," a program that provides services for and raises awareness of the needs of injured service members.
For more information about CSCMP's Annual Global Conference, click here.
Three new research projects investigate current hot topics
Since its inception, the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals has helped to guide and fund cutting-edge research to advance supply chain management practices. Currently CSCMP has three major research projects under way, with results to be published later this year. They include:
Offshoring Trends and Directions. This research initiative studies trends in offshoring and identifies the criteria currently being used to make offshoring decisions.
Supply Chain Management Talent Development. This research is exploring best practices in supply chain management talent development and retention.
Organizing Supply Chains in a Time of Change. Supply chain management organizations can be organized in a variety of ways, with different reporting arrangements, functional scope, and coordination structures. This research will ascertain whether certain business conditions make some supply chain organizations more effective than others.The three research teams will each provide a preview of their results at the Annual Global Conference in Atlanta.
To make members aware of these and other research efforts, CSCMP has launched a new publication, CSCMP Hot Topics. In two to four pages, Hot Topics highlights new research and insights or revisits older research topics that have reemerged as critical issues. The first issue of CSCMP Hot Topics covers the organization's offshoring research. To learn more about this publication, go to cscmp.org, and under the Member Only menu, select Hot Topics.
CSCMP On-Site Education comes to you!
Professional education of supply chain management talent has become a critical need for companies that want to maximize employee performance. Yet it's hard for employees at all levels to take extended time away from their daily responsibilities. For companies facing this challenge, CSCMP On-Site Education is a cost-efficient and timely solution.
Thanks to its global membership and relationships with educators and leading practitioners worldwide, CSCMP can provide educational workshops and seminars at any company location or facility anywhere in the world. This can significantly reduce or eliminate travel time and costs, create an efficient in-house educational experience, and enhance team building while staff learns together.
Curricula can be created for any type of organization, function, location, market, or industry. Organizations can choose an established CSCMP on-site workshop or develop a program that meets the business needs of an individual enterprise. Established on-site workshops cover change management, fundamentals of supply chain management, global supply chain management, SCM collaboration, relationship management, and strategic issues. Education levels range from introductory to intermediate and advanced.
On-Site Education programs qualify for one SCPro continuing education unit (CEU) per one hour of instruction. (Learn more about CSCMP's SCPro Certification at cscmpcertification.org.)
To discuss how CSCMP can deliver targeted education to your organization, contact Director of Education & Research Kathleen Hedland at khedland@cscmp.org, or call +1 630.645.3463.
CSCMP Explores... looks at humanitarian logistics
The United Nations believes that the global demand for humanitarian assistance will continue to rise. The reasons: escalating conflicts and a dramatic increase in vulnerabilities caused by financial crises, increasing food scarcity and prices, insufficiency of energy and water, and the increased severity of disasters.
Supply chain management plays a critical role in helping governments and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) address those problems. Accordingly, Humanitarian Relief: Broken Supply Chains and Role of the Private Sector, the latest publication in the CSCMP Explores... series of booklets, investigates how logistics and supply chain professionals can play a role in filling important gaps in the humanitarian supply chain.
Topics in the CSCMP Explores... series focus on practical, real-world information that can inform day-to-day decisions and help prepare readers to handle the uncertainties of today's economy. Issues alternate between in-depth coverage of supply chain topics and case studies that showcase best practices and lessons learned from implementations.
Online merchants should consider seven key factors about American consumers in order to optimize their sales and operations this holiday season, according to a report from DHL eCommerce.
First, many of the most powerful sales platforms are marketplaces. With nearly universal appeal, 99% of U.S. shoppers buy from marketplaces, ranked in popularity from Amazon (92%) to Walmart (68%), eBay (47%), Temu (32%), Etsy (28%), and Shein (21%).
Second, they use them often, with 61% of American shoppers buying online at least once a week. Among the most popular items are online clothing and footwear (63%), followed by consumer electronics (33%) and health supplements (30%).
Third, delivery is a crucial aspect of making the sale. Fully 94% of U.S. shoppers say delivery options influence where they shop online, and 45% of consumers abandon their baskets if their preferred delivery option is not offered.
That finding meshes with another report released this week, as a white paper from FedEx Corp. and Morning Consult said that 75% of consumers prioritize free shipping over fast shipping. Over half of those surveyed (57%) prioritize free shipping when making an online purchase, even more than finding the best prices (54%). In fact, 81% of shoppers are willing to increase their spending to meet a retailer’s free shipping threshold, FedEx said.
In additional findings from DHL, the Weston, Florida-based company found:
43% of Americans have an online shopping subscription, with pet food subscriptions being particularly popular (44% compared to 25% globally). Social Media Influence:
61% of shoppers use social media for shopping inspiration, and 26% have made a purchase directly on a social platform.
37% of Americans buy from online retailers in other countries, with 70% doing so at least once a month. Of the 49% of Americans who buy from abroad, most shop from China (64%), followed by the U.K. (29%), France (23%), Canada (15%), and Germany (13%).
While 58% of shoppers say sustainability is important, they are not necessarily willing to pay more for sustainable delivery options.
Gulf Coast businesses in Louisiana and Texas are keeping a watchful eye on the latest storm to emerge from the Gulf Of Mexico this week, as Hurricane Rafael nears Cuba.
The category 2 storm’s edges could also brush Florida as it heads northwest, causing tropical storm force winds in the lower and middle Florida keys. However, the weather agency said it is too soon to forecast Rafael’s impact on the U.S. western Gulf Coast.
In the face of campaign pledges by Donald Trump to boost tariffs on imports, many U.S. business interests are pushing back on that policy plan following Trump’s election yesterday as president-elect.
U.S. firms are already rushing to import goods before the promised tariff increases take effect, to avoid potential cost increases. That’s because tariffs are paid by the domestic companies that order the goods, not by the foreign nation that makes them.
That dynamic would likely increase prices for U.S. consumers as importers pass along the extra cost in the form of price hikes, according to an analysis by the National Retail Federation (NRF). Specifically, Trump’s tariff plan would boost prices in six consumer product categories: apparel, toys, furniture, household appliances, footwear, and travel goods. “Retailers rely heavily on imported products and manufacturing components so that they can offer their customers a variety of products at affordable prices,” NRF Vice President of Supply Chain and Customs Policy Jonathan Gold said in a release. “A tariff is a tax paid by the U.S. importer, not a foreign country or the exporter. This tax ultimately comes out of consumers’ pockets through higher prices.”
The rush to avoid those swollen costs can already be measured in the form of rising rates for transporting ocean freight, as companies start buffering their inventories before the new administration officially announces tariff hikes. Transpacific rates are still $1,000/FEU or more above their April lows, showing increased ocean volumes and climbing rates generated by shippers’ concerns about supply chain disruptions including port strikes and the Trump tariff increases, supply chain visibility provider Freightos said in an analysis. "The Trump win may start shaking up supply chains even before he takes office. Just the anticipation of higher tariffs may lead importers to pull forward shipments, creating a preemptive freight frenzy," Judah Levine, Head of Research at Freightos, said in a release. “Frontloading will cause freight rates to feel the heat as importers race to dodge the extra costs, similar to what took place with Trump’s tariffs on Chinese goods in 2018 and 2019."
Another group sounding a note of caution about international trade developments was the Global Cold Chain Alliance (GCCA), a trade group which represents some 1,500 member companies in more than 90 countries that provide temperature-controlled warehousing, logistics, and transportation. “We congratulate President Trump on his election. We also congratulate all those who have been elected to the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives,” GCCA President and CEO Sara Stickler said in a statement. “We are also committed to promoting the growth of exports from U.S.-based food production and broader manufacturing sectors. We will engage constructively in the policy discussion about future trade policy and continue to make the case for the importance of maintaining balanced and resilient trade routes for food and other temperature-controlled products across the world.”
Businesses in the European Union (EU) were likewise wary of tariff plans, judging by a statement from the VDMA, a trade group representing 3,600 German and European machinery and equipment manufacturing companies. "Donald Trump's second term will be a greater challenge for German and European industry than his first presidency. We must take his tariff announcements seriously, in particular. This will once again put a noticeable strain on transatlantic trade and investment relations," VDMA Executive Director Thilo Brodtmann said in a statement. “The USA is and will remain the most important export market outside the EU for mechanical and plant engineering from Germany. Our companies offer the products required to implement the re-industrialization of the USA that Donald Trump is striving for. The VDMA's overall outlook for the American market therefore remains positive."
In addition to its flagship Clorox bleach product, Oakland, California-based Clorox manages a diverse catalog of brands including Hidden Valley Ranch, Glad, Pine-Sol, Burt’s Bees, Kingsford, Scoop Away, Fresh Step, 409, Brita, Liquid Plumr, and Tilex.
British carbon emissions reduction platform provider M2030 is designed to help suppliers measure, manage and reduce carbon emissions. The new partnership aims to advance decarbonization throughout Clorox's value chain through the collection of emissions data, jointly identified and defined actions for reduction and continuous upskilling.
The program, which will record key figures on energy, will be gradually rolled out to several suppliers of the company's strategic raw materials and packaging, which collectively represents more than half of Clorox's scope 3 emissions.
M2030 enables suppliers to regularly track and share their progress with other customers using the M2030 platform. Suppliers will also be able to export relevant compatible data for submission to the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP), a global disclosure system to manage environmental data.
"As part of Clorox's efforts to foster a cleaner world, we have a responsibility to ensure our suppliers are equipped with the capabilities necessary for forging their own sustainability journeys," said Niki King, Chief Sustainability Officer at The Clorox Company. "Climate action is a complex endeavor that requires companies to engage all parts of their supply chain in order to meaningfully reduce their environmental impact."
Supply chain risk analytics company Everstream Analytics has launched a product that can quantify the impact of leading climate indicators and project how identified risk will impact customer supply chains.
Expanding upon the weather and climate intelligence Everstream already provides, the new “Climate Risk Scores” tool enables clients to apply eight climate indicator risk projection scores to their facilities and supplier locations to forecast future climate risk and support business continuity.
The tool leverages data from the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to project scores to varying locations using those eight category indicators: tropical cyclone, river flood, sea level rise, heat, fire weather, cold, drought and precipitation.
The Climate Risk Scores capability provides indicator risk projections for key natural disaster and weather risks into 2040, 2050 and 2100, offering several forecast scenarios at each juncture. The proactive planning tool can apply these insights to an organization’s systems via APIs, to directly incorporate climate projections and risk severity levels into your action systems for smarter decisions. Climate Risk scores offer insights into how these new operations may be affected, allowing organizations to make informed decisions and mitigate risks proactively.
“As temperatures and extreme weather events around the world continue to rise, businesses can no longer ignore the impact of climate change on their operations and suppliers,” Jon Davis, Chief Meteorologist at Everstream Analytics, said in a release. “We’ve consulted with the world’s largest brands on the top risk indicators impacting their operations, and we’re thrilled to bring this industry-first capability into Explore to automate access for all our clients. With pathways ranging from low to high impact, this capability further enables organizations to grasp the full spectrum of potential outcomes in real-time, make informed decisions and proactively mitigate risks.”