For the past 31 years, Shawn Curran has worked in supply chain management at Gap Inc. He sat down with Supply Chain Management Review to discuss his career, the evolution of Gap Inc.’s supply chain and the future of the profession. In July 2016, SCMR published “A portrait of the supply chain manager,” our look
Just months before the start of the 2016 holiday season, one of Gap Inc.’s distribution centers was destroyed by fire. Here’s the story of how resilience and innovation saved the day. It’s November, which means the holiday season is right around the corner. For most retailers, gearing up for peak is a matter of getting
Keep an eye on micro-fulfillment and the development of AI On New Year’s Day, I posted a blog on the technologies I’ll be watching in 2020. The other day, I realized there are two more of note that I inadvertently omitted. This is what happens when you do things on a day when you’re thinking about football
Technology continues to be the driving force, but it’s evolving. In early December, a researcher asked me what were going to be the solutions driving the supply chain 20 years from now. To be honest, I didn’t have a clue. I think back to stories I was writing less than a decade ago, and none
Last summer, we heard from supply chain executives from three small to mid-sized companies on the challenges faced by their organizations and how they’re addressing them. When it comes to managing their order fulfillment and logistics processes, mid-sized companies are, well, caught in the middle. On the one hand, their customers expect the same level
Once slow to adopt automation, 3PLs are now leading the way. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never thought of 3PLs as innovators or early adopters of technology. Given the short-term nature of their contracts, the industry players focused on taking the fat out of processes and being great operators with conventional processes. Based
Last-mile delivery is expensive and complicated. Solutions range from smart lockers to GPS sensors and advanced data analytics look to change that equation. If there ever was a scrum in the supply chain, it’s last-mile delivery. And it’s a worldwide scrum, no less. From China to Europe to the U.S., companies as divergent as Amazon, SF Express, Shipt, Instacart and XPO
Did you get your package from Amazon today? Good. But did you realize that Amazon is changing how it gets packages to you? If not, it’s worth a few minutes to get caught up here. Every so often it’s good to look in on Amazon and see what it’s doing to change supply chains, especially
It’s still early stages, but Rochester Drug Cooperative is proving that mobile robotic piece picking can get the job done in the right application. Up on a 19,000-square-foot mezzanine in a distribution center in western New York, order selectors at either end of a pick module are directed by voice as they walk through their
A new survey from SCMR and ASCM looks at how our readers and members are experiencing risk. When the Supply Chain Risk Management Consortium was formed 10 years ago, Greg Schlegel, one of the founders of the organization, remembers that just four or five attendees out of 20 to 25 raised their hands when asked
