Are you up yet?! What do you want for breakfast? Look in the other drawer. Don’t forget your lunch in the fridge. Why is this binder on the floor? I have no idea where your other sneaker is, just look for it! Did you brush your teeth? If we don’t leave in one minute we’re going to be late! Yes, school is back in session, and so is the morning chaos of getting four kids […]
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Archive for CH Robinson – Page 2
Gathering benchmark data to drive better procurement is a very valuable exercise. In the realm of transportation, this means getting benchmark data on what companies are paying to move freight on particular lanes. However, for a benchmark to be valid, you need a sufficiently large sample size, which is not a problem if you are moving freight from New York City to Chicago, but what if you have regular flatbed shipments between Helena, Montana and […]
Read More →Not every surprise is a good one—especially when your customers, shipments, and transportation are concerned. But you can develop a comprehensive truckload plan so you’re prepared to handle just about anything. Here’s a simple formula that many successful shippers already use as a truckload strategy in any market environment. Core Carrier +1 (or CC+1 for short). Here’s how it works for companies that prefer to have both asset carriers and 3PLs working in their supply […]
Read More →Everyone wants to know where truckload prices are headed in 2012. To get closer to an answer, there are several factors to consider that may—or may not—affect pricing this year. For much of 2010 and 2011, the industry anticipated a “perfect storm” of regulation and legislation that would hit the market simultaneously, subsequently raising rates through the roof. But although rates have risen more than their historical average for the last two years, the perfect […]
Read More →Over the past few weeks I’ve attend TMC’s Interactive Client Forum and Descartes’ Evolution 2011 User Conference (TMC and Descartes are ARC clients). At both conferences, there were speakers focused on regulatory trends in transportation. The Descartes conference featured Annette Sandberg, a former Administrator of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA). TMC’s conference featured Angie Freeman, C.H. Robinson’s VP of Investor Relations and Public Affairs (TMC is the transportation managed services division of C.H. […]
Read More →What is a rate curve? If you do not know the answer to this question or only have a vague notion of what the term means, then you are missing out on a relatively simple, but powerful freight management tool. Don’t feel bad if you are nonplussed; in our experience many practitioners are unfamiliar with the concept. When used in conjunction with the analytics of a good transportation management system, rate curves consistently drive cost […]
Read More →When companies build global supply chains they often leave one crucial piece out of the puzzle: transportation management systems (TMS). Freight transportation can be managed tactically at the local level, but every decision should be driven by a global strategy. To enable this, many companies are taking a “control tower” approach to freight management, either developing the capabilities in-house or working with a logistics service provider. What is a control tower for freight management? There […]
Read More →Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) is an integral part of advanced transportation management systems (TMS) and is largely viewed as providing the greatest time to value (see recent posting by Adrian Gonzalez of ARC Advisory Group titled, “Time-to-Value: Developing a SaaS Equivalent for 3PLs”). But as often happens when an innovative technology becomes widely adopted, users’ expectations rise a notch, opening the way for further refinements (see diagram below). In this case, the next step forward is software […]
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Supply Chain Brief
Guest Commentary: 4 Essentials of Total Transportation Cost (One Piece of Total Landed Cost)
As I noted in a recent blog posting, it’s not easy to accurately calculate total landed costs (TLC). But it’s the best way to understand your business at the subatomic level, find process gaps, and optimize your supply chain in every way. Here are the 4 things you must have to calculate total transportation costs—one piece of TLC—and what you can do with the results. Executive buy-in. Where do costs lie, and what internal profit […]
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