David Hindson, director of marketing and strategy for TDG, told delegates that third party logistics suppliers had to decide which road they wanted to ggo down if they wanted to prosper.
He set out two supply chain concepts; the ‘lean and mean’ system and ‘supply chain re-engineering’. Contract logistics has come a long way since the 1980s, when distribution was a backwater and not really considered a profession at all.
Nowadays, contracts are shorter, margins are being squeezed and some companies are even considering bringing distribution operations back in-house.
Hindson said that when considering outsourcing operations, working practices needed to be challenged.