Increasing customer value and decreasing distribution costs ... - LRG

IJPDLM33,2140The graphs for the two operating models compare the cumulative costs. Thecosts are indexed so that 100 represents the total delivery chain costs withdirect deliveries. (The same indexing is used also in Figures 2-4.) In the case of atypical MRO order the cost of merging the order lines is lower than the extracost of receiving separate shipments at the customer end. From a total supplychain perspective the difference in total costs is approximately 13 per cent.A best-case for merge-in-transitIn the ®rst delivery example the order was selected to represent a typical orderfor the MRO distributor. The second example is a best case from the point ofview of merge-in-transit. The suppliers remain the same, but the size of theorder is larger, there are now 41 lines in the order. Also, the customer is nowlocated far away from the consolidation point. In this situation consolidationdirectly improves the cost ef®ciency of transportation.The cumulative distribution costs of the example order are illustrated inFigure 2. The indexing principle is the same as in Figure 1. The index 100represents the total delivery chain costs with direct deliveries for the exampleorder.Figure 2.Cumulative deliverychain costs of a best-caseorder for merge-in-transit