AI Power Drives Supply Chain Gymnastics

If you’re reading Inbound Logistics, you already drank the supply chain Kool-Aid. But many others in our audience are tasting the inbound logistics brew for the first time.

“Inbound logistics makes sense,” they say as they sip. “But it’s a lot more complicated than just letting my vendors and logistics partners control my inbound flow.  I just don’t think I can handle that.”

It tastes great, but all those inbound data points make it more filling. Would a chaser make that brew more palatable? Got one for you: AI. Inbound logistics and AI is a combination that really shines in times like these.

Amplifying your inbound programs using artificial intelligence will give you more choices and more alternatives, and flatten the impact of disruptive events, such as the recent ones that have likely affected you: hurricane devastation, strikes, low tide in the Panama Canal, blockage in the Suez Canal, collapsing bridges, rocket and drone attacks on maritime commerce, BRICS’ attack on the greenback as the world’s trade reserve currency, wars, trade wars, rail disasters, over-regulation. Enough!

Maintain margins during supply chain disruptions? Sure. But it’s also important to lock in customers with your brand when things go sideways for them. Stew Leonard Jr., president of Stew Leonard’s, said that the regional supermarket was going to have to do “some supply chain gymnastics” to ensure customers have plenty of the products they know and love.

Blending AI with your efforts to match your supply more closely to demand makes all those extra data points more manageable. Whatever management tools you use for data analytics—from basic spreadsheets to a best-in-class TMS, and including tie-ins with your logistics intermediaries, brokers, forwarders, and 3PLs—you can fire up decision-making on the fly by using AI to make sense of all those increased data points.

Many leading logistics partners are investing in AI right now to serve you better, faster and more efficiently. Tie their solutions to controlling your inbound flow.

Inbound logistics and AI drive enterprise efficiency in normal times, if we ever have normal times again. But that combination can mean the difference between surviving the next catastrophe and losing customers, market share, and maybe much more. It will earn you a gold medal in supply chain gymnastics.