The Supply Chainer

Logistics operators electrifying heavy commercial fleets in 2026 face a widening gap between vehicle acquisition timelines and the infrastructure needed to charge them. The friction is not technological. Charging hardware exists, vehicle pl...

When a fresh produce truck misses its scheduled departure window, the cost stacks up within hours. Perishable inventory ages in staging. Store replenishment slips. Shelves at receiving outlets sit short on high-velocity SKUs by morning. For operators running automated picking systems across hundreds of stores, the warehouse control system carries most of that weight. Pressure is sharpest during peak periods, when seasonal demand compresses inbound scheduling and outbound disp

The modern distribution yard has improved meaningfully over the last couple of decades, as more customers have recognized the value of dropped trailer programs and the efficiency they can bring to the broader supply chain. Dedicated yard operations, trailer pools and better coordination between transportation and warehouse teams have helped many sites increase throughput and reduce unnecessary friction. Even with that progress, however, the yard still represents one of the be

When retailers operate across marketplaces, dropship networks, and direct-to-consumer channels simultaneously, inventory accuracy becomes a distributed coordination problem. Stock levels fragment across enterprise resource planning systems,...

Episode 128 of the Resilient Supply Chain Podcast examines the hidden governance risks behind critical mineral supply chains. Host Tom Raftery is joined by Johan Oosthuizen, Associate Director and Responsible Sourcing Lead for Africa at SLR Consulting, for a discussion on responsible sourcing, audit data, verification, and the practical limits of self-reporting. The conversation focuses on why mineral supply chains cannot be assessed through policy statements alone, particula

Operational pressure is mounting for agrifood and manufacturing leaders. Disruptions in key chokepoints like the Strait of Hormuz drive sharp increases in costs for fertilizer, feed, fuel, freight, and food. Legacy systems struggle with rapid modeling of interconnected decisions across procurement, inventory, and logistics. Operators face fragmented data, sequential optimization failures, and mounting execution gaps that expose thin margins. According to the FAO, 20-45% of ke

For freight brokers, the operational risk is no longer limited to finding capacity at the right price. Increasingly, the challenge is proving that the carrier moving the load was properly vetted before the freight ever left the dock. That pressure has intensified following recent legal and regulatory developments in the U.S. trucking market. The Montgomery v. Caribe Transport II ruling, combined with heightened scrutiny of commercial driver licensing and carrier compliance, h

Warehouse and transportation operators generate more data than ever. Yet many still struggle to turn visibility into consistent execution at enterprise scale. The core dilemma is the persistent gap between knowing what is happening and acting effectively in real time on labor shifts, exceptions, inventory issues, and operational disruptions. Visibility Falls Short Amy Dean of SC Codeworks replied in writing to The Supply Chainer. SC Codeworks delivers warehouse management sys

For fleets, uptime is everything. And so is ease of doing business. A truck can get serviced on time, the parts can be in stock and the repair can be completed correctly, but the experience still breaks down if the invoice doesn’t match negotiated pricing, payment terms vary by location or the fleet’s A/P team spends hours reconciling paperwork across multiple service points. Those issues may seem administrative, but they shape how fleets evaluate suppliers. Across the commer

Shippers are running into concrete execution problems. Primary carriers are turning down more contracted loads than models anticipated, pushing volume onto spot markets where rates moved up sharply in the first half of the year. This creates immediate cost overruns and forces transportation teams to scramble for capacity on short notice. Missed drayage appointments at distribution centers trigger detention and demurrage that eat into margins quickly when windows are tight. Ex

Procurement teams at manufacturers and large operators face mounting pressure from slow requisition cycles, sourcing delays and compliance complexity that inflate costs and tie up capital. These execution gaps have grown more acute as organizations scale spend management across fragmented systems and supplier networks. Operational Bottlenecks in Spend Management Visibility into transactions exists but often fails to translate into faster decisions at the point of execution. D

Southeast Asian container terminals operate under constant pressure to coordinate vessel berthing, automated crane sequences, yard handoffs, and manual ground operations across multiple shifts without communication delays. A single missed h...