Noted: The Supply Chain in Brief-June 2019

Green Seeds

• Nestle aims to make all of its packaging recyclable or reusable by 2025, starting with using paper packaging to replace the plastic materials used for Smarties candies, Nesquik, and YES! snack bars. The company will also eliminate plastic straws from its products and reduce plastic waste impact by increasing recycled PET content in bottles to 35%.
• Panalpina Singapore launched new trucks to align with L’Oréal Travel Retail Asia Pacific’s sustainability program, Sharing Beauty With All. The trucks run on biodiesel fuel derived from vegetable oil or animal fat. Panalpina’s biodiesel fuel supply comes from collecting waste cooking oil from restaurants across Singapore.
• Beauty company L’Occitane Group signed a multi-year agreement with Loop Industries to support its goal of 100% sustainable product packaging. Loop Industries’ patented upcycling technology breaks down polyester plastics and fibers in products and repurposes them in virgin-quality polyester plastic packaging.

Recognition

• Technicolor honored Dayton Freight Lines with its LTL Carrier of the Year award. The content creator awards one carrier that excels in on-time pickups and deliveries with preassigned arrival times, electronic data interface capabilities, and customer support.
• General Motors presented Penske Logistics with the 2018 Supplier of the Year and Overdrive awards. The Supplier of the Year award recognizes companies that consistently exceed expectations and introduce innovations to supply chain operations; the Overdrive award honors organizations that exhibit leadership in cultural change and commitment initiatives.
• The Alaska Trucking Association presented Alaska West Express with the 2018 Alaska Safe Truck Fleet of the Year award. The distinction honors carriers with impressive safety performances, including accident frequency rates; Compliance, Safety and Accountability (CSA) scores; and OSHA-recordable injuries.

Up the Chain

Walgreens appointed Colin Nelson as its first global chief supply chain officer. In this new role, Nelson is in charge of managing the end-to-end supply chain, improving efficiencies, and building on the current network to enhance customer satisfaction as the pharmacy store chain continues to build its digital presence.

Good Works

Old Dominion Freight Line donated more than 12,000 baseballs to Pitch In For Baseball & Softball, a charity that gives children access to recreation and contributes to positive youth development. Old Dominion transported the balls in its “clear” trailer (photo, bottom right), which traveled around the country in 2017 and 2018, visiting the All-Star Game, major league stadiums, and Old Dominion service centers.

M&A

• Americold Realty Trust, a publicly traded real estate investment trust focused on temperature-controlled warehouses, acquired Lanier Cold Storage, which consists of two temperature-controlled facilities.
• Wind Point Partners, a private equity firm, bought A&R Logistics, a provider of integrated dry bulk logistics solutions for the chemical and plastic industries.
• C.H. Robinson, a provider of multimodal transportation services and third-party logistics, acquired Dema Service, a provider of European road transportation.
• Descartes Systems Group, a multinational technology company, bought Core Transport Technologies NZ Limited, an electronic transportation network that provides global air carriers and ground handlers with shipment scanning and tracking solutions.
• Burris Logistics, a supply chain solutions provider, acquired Trinity Logistics, a third-party logistics company specializing in freight arrangement and supply chain solutions.

Shovel Ready

• Amazon broke ground on a 3-million-square-foot air cargo hub and 250,000-square-foot loading dock at the Cincinnati Northern Kentucky International Airport. The new hub will support more than 100 Prime Air cargo planes, and its centralized location will allow Amazon trucks to reach 11 fulfillment centers within a few hours.
• Chewy, an online pet food and supplies retailer, plans to build a distribution facility in Rowan County, North Carolina. In addition to creating 1,200 jobs, the new location will enhance the company’s delivery network across the southeastern United States, allowing it to service customers with faster delivery times.

Sealed Deals

• Pentair PLC, a water solutions provider, adopted RateLinx’s global transportation management, track and trace, and freight audit and payment system to automate processes, streamline supply chain operations, and consolidate data sources and systems.
• Goodwill South Florida and global transportation and logistics company Ryder System have joined forces to create the Ryder Apparel Manufacturing Division at the nonprofit’s headquarters in Miami. Ryder has invested in the division, which employs more than 1,100 people with disabilities and other barriers to work and produces approximately 6,000 U.S. military uniforms and veteran interment flags daily.