2-minute read 

Today’s reality: Short-term flexibility does not do the trick anymore

In today’s reality the logistics industry faces significant challenges from both the demand and supply planning side. For example, global disruptions cause bullwhip effects with higher peaks and dips in warehousing demand, while at the same time it is getting more difficult to find the right personnel when these peaks arise. Due to increasing inbound-outbound imbalances, occupancy has structurally increased and it is harder to find additional storage space. Consequently, logistics warehousing operations cannot be executed as efficiently as in the past. Some logistics companies now even confront their customers with additional ‘occupancy surcharges’ when occupancy exceeds certain levels.

Fire prevention: Bring proven forecasting and planning best practices to the logistics industry

The logistics industry seems to be in a similar situation as many of their manufacturing and retail customers were in few decades ago: facing a clear need to embrace forecasting and planning. High-quality forecasting and logistics planning can absorb the imminent demand and supply pressures without the need for heavy capacity investments or uncontrolled short-term costs. Simply by preventing short-term issues before they arise. For example, securing enough additional flex workers for a foreseen peak in demand, or freeing up storage space prior to an expected increase of overall stock levels.

The good news is that it does not have to take decades to make a step up in this area. Logistics can profit from the proven forecasting and planning best practices that have been developed for their customers throughout the years. EyeOn Planning Services has bundled these best practices and related data science capabilities in recurrent services for its customers. This allows logistics companies to immediately harvest the benefits, while following a steep learning curve on how to effectively acquire actionable insights in ‘what happened’ and how to accurately forecast and plan ‘what is coming’.

Logistics planning Leaders vs laggards

Frontrunner logistics companies recognize the need to absorb best-practices in forecasting and planning. They see that now is the moment to plan further ahead and get ready for the years to come. By doing so these companies will experience more control and efficiency, ensuring a smooth operational process on the short-term, and preventing the need for costly firefighting.

This will give them a clear competitive advantage compared to industry peers sticking to old habits!

Ready to boost your fire prevention? EyeOn Planning Services can help you. Contact us now!

The post Stop firefighting in warehouse logistics planning appeared first on EyeOn.

With the holiday season just around the corner, many companies struggle even more with resource planning and are looking for solutions to make their processes more efficient. A solid foundation for planning workload, and the ability to quickly react to changes, is therefore extremely important.

Create the right focus

An important step towards improving the workload planning is by having a good view on the expected workload on at least a daily level. Many companies in the logistics industry experience strong day of the week seasonality. So rather than having a total forecasted workload for the week, you should opt for a daily granularity that captures these patterns. Companies might also experience end of the month and end of the quarter seasonality that can be taken into account as well using daily granularity.

These patterns are not the same for the entire warehouse, but they can be – and probably are – different per product or customer group. One product group may have a relatively constant workload each day of the week, whereas another group experiences a peak in workload on Wednesday and a dip on Friday. With an effective planning process you will be able to anticipate these dynamics.

Warehouse planning: dealing with various market dynamics

Moreover, there are several holiday dynamics in the logistics industry to consider. For example, warehouses may be closed on public holidays and workload peak is therefor expected right before or after this closure depending on the day of the week . To take these events into account you need more advanced forecasting models, like machine learning models. These techniques are generally not available to companies ’out-of-the-box’, especially when taking additional workload drivers into account, like weather or order book information. EyeOn Planning Services has the capabilities to build and customize fit-for-purpose advanced models based on business requirements. This way logistics companies can fully leverage the value hidden in the data that is available to them, to steer their operations in the most effective way.
In a dynamic market your planning needs to be responsive to changes. At EyeOn Planning Services, we have the ability to generate a workload forecast on a daily basis, automatically integrated into our customer’s system , taking into account the latest actuals.

Do you want to make the next step in your warehouse planning?

For more information on how we can support, please contact one of our experts or read more about boosting logistics performance.

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