Nominations for CSCMP's 2015 Distinguished Service Award will be accepted through April 30, 2015.
Receiving CSCMP's Distinguished Service Award (DSA) is a little bit like being inducted into the Supply Chain Hall of Fame. Past winners include such luminaries as the late Don Bowersox, who literally wrote the book on supply chain management; H. Lee Scott Jr., who rose from the logistics and transportation department at Wal-Mart to become the retailing giant's president and chief executive officer; and Joe Andraski, who advocated for greater trading partner collaboration at both Nabisco and the Voluntary Interindustry Commerce Solutions (VICS) industry association.
Do you know a current supply chain superstar who is qualified to join their ranks? Then consider nominating him or her for the 2015 Distinguished Service Award. Nominations are due by April 30, 2015.
The DSA is given to an academic, consultant, or practitioner who exemplifies sustained, consistent, and excellent service to the discipline of supply chain management. Nominees should meet five criteria:
Recognition as a leader in supply chain management: The nominee should have a demonstrable track record across multiple aspects of the global supply chain. This may include improving company value or contributing to groundbreaking research.
Contributions above the normal expectations of the job: This could be demonstrated in numerous ways, such as mentoring or coaching other professionals or small businesses, using their supply chain capabilities to improve aid or disaster relief efforts, or working with educational and professional development programs.
Recognition as an innovator in supply chain management: Nominees' efforts should have resulted in an order of magnitude difference in the profession. They may have "changed the rules of the game" or applied existing concepts to achieve success in new areas.
Education of the supply chain management profession: The nominee must have enhanced the awareness of or the understanding of the profession, either through writing or through oral presentations.
Distinguished record of contribution to the discipline of supply chain management: The nominee should have made a broad impact across the supply chain, have a sustained level of outstanding achievement, and be well-recognized as one of the top achievers in the field.
Information about the nomination process, nomination forms, and a list of past winners can be found here.
Also, consider submitting nominations for other CSCMP annual awards: the Doctoral Dissertation Award, the Supply Chain Innovation Award, and the Emerging Leader Award. Information is available at cscmp.org, under "Career & Awards."
"Definitive Guide" series helps you master SCM's core areas
A new series of guidebooks from the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals (CSCMP) explains the what, why, and how of supply chain management while providing practical advice on implementing best practices.
By definition, logistics and supply chain management (SCM) cover a lot of territory. As a practitioner, you're expected to know something about everything—transportation, procurement, inventory, order fulfillment, customer service, and much more. Not only that, you're expected to understand how all these pieces fit together. A tall order, but a new series of guidebooks from the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals (CSCMP) can help explain it all while providing practical advice on implementing best practices in your operation.
The "Definitive Guide" series covers the following subjects: integrated supply chain management, inventory management, manufacturing and service operations, order fulfillment and customer service, supply chain best practices, supply management and procurement, transportation, and warehousing.
Each book is designed to help readers master the subject and apply what they've learned in daily practice as well as in strategic and tactical planning and problem solving. The books also analyze current challenges and emerging trends in supply chain management and explain how to reduce costs while improving performance.
In addition, The Definitive Guide to Supply Chain Best Practices includes case studies that were specially commissioned by CSCMP for the series. Case study topics include supply chain collaboration, advanced forecasting, management of inventory through cash-to-cash cycles, and transportation optimization.
Each book is co-authored by CSCMP and an expert in the field and is published by Financial Times Press. The books can be purchased individually or as a set. For details, click here.
ReposiTrak, a global food traceability network operator, will partner with Upshop, a provider of store operations technology for food retailers, to create an end-to-end grocery traceability solution that reaches from the supply chain to the retail store, the firms said today.
The partnership creates a data connection between suppliers and the retail store. It works by integrating Salt Lake City-based ReposiTrak’s network of thousands of suppliers and their traceability shipment data with Austin, Texas-based Upshop’s network of more than 450 retailers and their retail stores.
That accomplishment is important because it will allow food sector trading partners to meet the U.S. FDA’s Food Safety Modernization Act Section 204d (FSMA 204) requirements that they must create and store complete traceability records for certain foods.
And according to ReposiTrak and Upshop, the traceability solution may also unlock potential business benefits. It could do that by creating margin and growth opportunities in stores by connecting supply chain data with store data, thus allowing users to optimize inventory, labor, and customer experience management automation.
"Traceability requires data from the supply chain and – importantly – confirmation at the retail store that the proper and accurate lot code data from each shipment has been captured when the product is received. The missing piece for us has been the supply chain data. ReposiTrak is the leader in capturing and managing supply chain data, starting at the suppliers. Together, we can deliver a single, comprehensive traceability solution," Mark Hawthorne, chief innovation and strategy officer at Upshop, said in a release.
"Once the data is flowing the benefits are compounding. Traceability data can be used to improve food safety, reduce invoice discrepancies, and identify ways to reduce waste and improve efficiencies throughout the store,” Hawthorne said.
Under FSMA 204, retailers are required by law to track Key Data Elements (KDEs) to the store-level for every shipment containing high-risk food items from the Food Traceability List (FTL). ReposiTrak and Upshop say that major industry retailers have made public commitments to traceability, announcing programs that require more traceability data for all food product on a faster timeline. The efforts of those retailers have activated the industry, motivating others to institute traceability programs now, ahead of the FDA’s enforcement deadline of January 20, 2026.
Inclusive procurement practices can fuel economic growth and create jobs worldwide through increased partnerships with small and diverse suppliers, according to a study from the Illinois firm Supplier.io.
The firm’s “2024 Supplier Diversity Economic Impact Report” found that $168 billion spent directly with those suppliers generated a total economic impact of $303 billion. That analysis can help supplier diversity managers and chief procurement officers implement programs that grow diversity spend, improve supply chain competitiveness, and increase brand value, the firm said.
The companies featured in Supplier.io’s report collectively supported more than 710,000 direct jobs and contributed $60 billion in direct wages through their investments in small and diverse suppliers. According to the analysis, those purchases created a ripple effect, supporting over 1.4 million jobs and driving $105 billion in total income when factoring in direct, indirect, and induced economic impacts.
“At Supplier.io, we believe that empowering businesses with advanced supplier intelligence not only enhances their operational resilience but also significantly mitigates risks,” Aylin Basom, CEO of Supplier.io, said in a release. “Our platform provides critical insights that drive efficiency and innovation, enabling companies to find and invest in small and diverse suppliers. This approach helps build stronger, more reliable supply chains.”
Logistics industry growth slowed in December due to a seasonal wind-down of inventory and following one of the busiest holiday shopping seasons on record, according to the latest Logistics Managers’ Index (LMI) report, released this week.
The monthly LMI was 57.3 in December, down more than a percentage point from November’s reading of 58.4. Despite the slowdown, economic activity across the industry continued to expand, as an LMI reading above 50 indicates growth and a reading below 50 indicates contraction.
The LMI researchers said the monthly conditions were largely due to seasonal drawdowns in inventory levels—and the associated costs of holding them—at the retail level. The LMI’s Inventory Levels index registered 50, falling from 56.1 in November. That reduction also affected warehousing capacity, which slowed but remained in expansion mode: The LMI’s warehousing capacity index fell 7 points to a reading of 61.6.
December’s results reflect a continued trend toward more typical industry growth patterns following recent years of volatility—and they point to a successful peak holiday season as well.
“Retailers were clearly correct in their bet to stock [up] on goods ahead of the holiday season,” the LMI researchers wrote in their monthly report. “Holiday sales from November until Christmas Eve were up 3.8% year-over-year according to Mastercard. This was largely driven by a 6.7% increase in e-commerce sales, although in-person spending was up 2.9% as well.”
And those results came during a compressed peak shopping cycle.
“The increase in spending came despite the shorter holiday season due to the late Thanksgiving,” the researchers also wrote, citing National Retail Federation (NRF) estimates that U.S. shoppers spent just short of a trillion dollars in November and December, making it the busiest holiday season of all time.
The LMI is a monthly survey of logistics managers from across the country. It tracks industry growth overall and across eight areas: inventory levels and costs; warehousing capacity, utilization, and prices; and transportation capacity, utilization, and prices. The report is released monthly by researchers from Arizona State University, Colorado State University, Rochester Institute of Technology, Rutgers University, and the University of Nevada, Reno, in conjunction with the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals (CSCMP).
Specifically, the two sides remain at odds over provisions related to the deployment of semi-automated technologies like rail-mounted gantry cranes, according to an analysis by the Kansas-based 3PL Noatum Logistics. The ILA has strongly opposed further automation, arguing it threatens dockworker protections, while the USMX contends that automation enhances productivity and can create long-term opportunities for labor.
In fact, U.S. importers are already taking action to prevent the impact of such a strike, “pulling forward” their container shipments by rushing imports to earlier dates on the calendar, according to analysis by supply chain visibility provider Project44. That strategy can help companies to build enough safety stock to dampen the damage of events like the strike and like the steep tariffs being threatened by the incoming Trump administration.
Likewise, some ocean carriers have already instituted January surcharges in pre-emption of possible labor action, which could support inbound ocean rates if a strike occurs, according to freight market analysts with TD Cowen. In the meantime, the outcome of the new negotiations are seen with “significant uncertainty,” due to the contentious history of the discussion and to the timing of the talks that overlap with a transition between two White House regimes, analysts said.
That percentage is even greater than the 13.21% of total retail sales that were returned. Measured in dollars, returns (including both legitimate and fraudulent) last year reached $685 billion out of the $5.19 trillion in total retail sales.
“It’s clear why retailers want to limit bad actors that exhibit fraudulent and abusive returns behavior, but the reality is that they are finding stricter returns policies are not reducing the returns fraud they face,” Michael Osborne, CEO of Appriss Retail, said in a release.
Specifically, the report lists the leading types of returns fraud and abuse reported by retailers in 2024, including findings that:
60% of retailers surveyed reported incidents of “wardrobing,” or the act of consumers buying an item, using the merchandise, and then returning it.
55% cited cases of returning an item obtained through fraudulent or stolen tender, such as stolen credit cards, counterfeit bills, gift cards obtained through fraudulent means or fraudulent checks.
48% of retailers faced occurrences of returning stolen merchandise.
Together, those statistics show that the problem remains prevalent despite growing efforts by retailers to curb retail returns fraud through stricter returns policies, while still offering a sufficiently open returns policy to keep customers loyal, they said.
“Returns are a significant cost for retailers, and the rise of online shopping could increase this trend,” Kevin Mahoney, managing director, retail, Deloitte Consulting LLP, said. “As retailers implement policies to address this issue, they should avoid negatively affecting customer loyalty and retention. Effective policies should reduce losses for the retailer while minimally impacting the customer experience. This approach can be crucial for long-term success.”