Welcome to our 5th season of All Business. No Boundaries.! For those of you who have been listening for a while, we’d like to extend a heartfelt thank you for your support. To commemorate this milestone, we’re revisiting some of our favorite and most memorable episodes from the past five seasons. Listen now to our celebratory episode titled: 5 Seasons Picked, Packed, Shipped: Celebrating a Few of Our Favorite Breakthroughs. Thank you for being part of our journey!
Welcome to our 5th season of All Business. No Boundaries.! For those of you who have been listening for a while, we’d like to extend a heartfelt thank you for your support. To commemorate this milestone, we’re revisiting some of our favorite and most memorable episodes from the past five seasons. Listen now to our celebratory episode titled: 5 Seasons Picked, Packed, Shipped: Celebrating a Few of Our Favorite Breakthroughs. Thank you for being part of our journey!
Welcome to All Business. No Boundaries., a collection of supply chain stories by DHL Supply Chain, the North American leader in contract logistics. I’m your host Will Heywood. This is a place for in-depth discussions about the supply chain challenges keeping you up at night. We’re breaking beyond the boundaries that are limiting your supply chain.
In today’s episode, we’re doing something a little different. Those of you who have been listening for some time might know that we are now in our 5th season! To celebrate, we’re taking a look back at some of our favorite and most memorable episodes over the past five seasons. Let’s dive in.
We launched All Business. No Boundaries. in the heat of the pandemic in 2020 – a notable year for the supply chain and some could argue the perfect time to launch a podcast focused on supply chain challenges…there were plenty. During this season, we talked a lot about navigating this “new normal” and uncovered some compelling stories about supply chain resiliency and flexibility that have come to define the industry’s response to adversity.
In our third episode, we were joined by Kraig Foreman, President of eCommerce, and Larry Landtiser, VP of Operations for DHL Supply Chain, to discuss ‘Peak in a Pandemic.’ During this episode, Kraig and Larry outline our approach to peak season, what peak season means for eCommerce customers, how we typically plan for this time of year and how the pandemic changed the game. Let’s listen in:
[Snippet: 17:28 – 20:13]
I'm interested. And knowing how you guys are talking to your customers about peak season within the context of Covid, what you think you can plan for versus what you think you can't, how the control dynamics are perhaps changed this year. Craig, I'll start with you. I'll I'll take the first crack at that. I think this is everything that's on our minds and everything that's keeping us up at night at this point in time of 2020, not just the pandemic and how we're managing our way through it today, but it's the pandemic and how we're going to manage our way through peak season.
Every year. We work very closely with our customers on forecast and planning for peak season, and there is always an element of science and an element of crystal ball that goes into that forecast. Because consumer behavior, e-commerce, you are directly impacted by consumer behavior every minute of every day. That's just the reality of the way that this infrastructure is created.
And this phenomenon has been created and a peak season, it's no different. It's just and it's very heightened. And that's where the crystal ball aspect of trying to predict what a consumer is going to do comes into play. And I would say, you know, you maybe, you know, 70% science and 30% crystal ball every year you're building that forecast.
That would be season this year. I think we're inverting that ratio materially. I think that we have no idea what consumer behavior is going to do to things. We do know that e-commerce sales are going to grow. Who are they going to be growing with? Where is it going to be growing? Are they going to be ordering on Black Friday, or are they going to be ready to layer?
Are they going to get what they want out of the stores, can't get any sales, or people are going to be starting to go back to stores at that point. I mean, there there's so much unknown. And then you couple that whole consumer behavior unknown crystal ball impact with what we are dealing with in these fulfillment operations across the country, not just DHL.
Everybody is dealing with cross country to protect and keep our associates and our team members safe. You know, with the Covid 19 restrictions of social distancing and doing that, when you're taking you're attempting to take your workforce by, you know, 200% to 300% in your building, you still have to maintain social distancing, and you still have to look at the health and safety of your associates.
And how are we going to create that capacity. So that's something that we can control. And so that's where a lot of our focus is, is on how we maintain a very safe environment for our people at the highest capacity that we can get the facilities ready to. And that goes into our planning process and a process for people that we've dealt with in the past.
But this is just a more heightened approach that we need to take with more specific challenges to tackle.
Head over to ‘Peak in a Pandemic: Removing Boundaries to Deliver a Successful Holiday Season’ to hear the full story of peak during that unprecedented time, including how we kept our associates safe even when we needed to increase capacity to keep up with consumer demand. That was a wild time.
Let’s move on from 2020.
In Season 2, we turned our attention to the thrilling frontier of digital innovation in supply chain management. This season was marked by captivating discussions on data analytics and accelerated digitalization, the agility and adaptability reshaping the retail landscape and strategies for driving growth in the post-pandemic supply chain environment.
I had many favorite moments from this season, but my producers here told me I needed to pick just one. The highlight for me was hearing about our first deployment of high reach autonomous forklifts at a site for The Campbell’s Soup Company.
In this episode, The Future of the Digital Supply Chain is M’M M’M Good, I was joined by Brendan Washington, Vice President of Logistics and Customer Supply Chain, The Campbell’s Soup Company, Jim Gaskell, Director of Global Automation and Emerging Technologies, Crown Equipment and Mark Smith, Senior Vice President of Operations, DHL Supply Chain.
Here Brendan from Campbell’s is telling us about what this new technology means for our people and the benefits they’re already seeing:
[Snippet: See audio in folder]
Yeah. So, you know, in our current environment, one of the macroeconomic factors that we're up against is just rising labor costs. Right. And you see in the news what's happening with labor, where in essence, when you remove that as a component, it helps to defray some of the risks associated with that. I mean, we love our people and we want to take care of our people.
And as you know, we are able to find ways for that involve less reliance on labor. It actually helps us to do that better with the teams that we do have. I think additional Lee, when you talk about fixed automation systems, that could be an alternative to having the mobile forklifts. These are actually much less expensive than going with some of the fixed systems, and much more flexible.
They can be reconfigured to move things to different parts of the warehouse over time, rather than the some of the fixed solutions that you see in some of the older automation attempts. When we look at the prospect for utility costs possibly being lower and, you know, the ability to operate in 24 hour conditions, and sometimes people aren't going to be able to do some of those things.
And for example, in dark rooms, you know, forklifts don't necessarily need light that's needed for human beings to, you know, operate. And so we see that as a potential benefit. And then I think lastly, as I think about some of the outcomes that we're seeing, and when we look at inventory accuracy, the automation and the software, like it's not going to miss, it's not.
Again, when you talk about human error, we're not going to see some of those issues where, you know, the put away is is marked incorrectly or something like that. And so I think we're starting to see some of those benefits. And I think as we scale up, we're we're looking forward to seeing more of those benefits come forward.
So Jim. Oh go ahead go ahead. I was just going to add to what was just said. So there's two unique things that are really taking place. They're not completely unique but they're interesting. Unique is the system gets fed by manual operators on one side bringing product in, and then it gets its output, goes to a pad rack that manual operators take pallets out.
Well, you don't have to dial back too many years. And automation where an automated vehicle couldn't handle a pallet that was placed by a manual operator because it would go into an air. But this system, because of the camera system it uses, can actually pick up a pallet of manual operator placed and put it in the rack without detecting any errors.
And also, you know, make decisions about placing the pallet based on the circumstances, adjacent pallets and things like that. I think that's, certainly a valid thing that you would see if you went to this site.
Listen to the full episode to hear more about the first deployment of autonomous forklifts at Campbell’s, the early ROI we’re seeing and what’s next for the technology.
That brings us to season 3 where we focused on exploring the evolving landscapes of supply chain sustainability and continued our focus on innovation and digitalization. From forecasting the future of supply chains with a lens on sustainability and diversity to diving into the strategic partnerships driving operational excellence, each episode in season 3 offers a glimpse into the transformative initiatives shaping the industry.
Season 3 is also home to our most listened to episode – Stretching the Limits of Supply Chain Digitalization: A Conversation with Boston Dynamics. In this episode, Sally Miller, our current Chief Information Officer for North America and Global Digital Transformation Officer and recently named Global CIO, and Marc Theermann, Chief Strategy Officer from Boston Dynamics walk us through the partnership between DHL Supply Chain and Boston Dynamics and how we worked to develop a first-of-its-kind robot for the warehouse: Stretch. Let’s listen in:
[Snippet: 16:54 - ~22:00]
I want to shift gears a little bit to the partnership between DHL and Boston Dynamics, and as a technology provider and a operations provider or solution provider. So you mentioned this started in 2018. Can you guys talk about sort of how these relationships evolve and what you look for in a partner respectively, and, you know, kind of how these things build up over time to get to where we are now.
Sure. I can talk specifically to the Boston Dynamics partnership evolve. It started with just a personal connection with the CEO, Robert Plater, and I really liked his openness to understanding the operational part of what we do. At the same time, we were learning how robotics are developed and built and trying to leverage their vast experience in the field.
So it started out just as, hey, let's take a look at some of your sites, see what you do better understand it. And what can we develop to help you. So it evolved from there. And as Boston Dynamics started developing prototypes, we would try them out in our operation. They would watch the performance take a back end to the lab, tweak, develop.
And it's been very exciting and gratifying to see the evolution from the first prototype to the actual product of stretch as it is today. And like I've mentioned, I think it's more use cases for stretch and potential other applications in what we do and supply chain. So we'll continue to have the open dialog. And as Boston Dynamics gains for our experience and education and our pain points, and can develop solutions, we will collaborate, co-develop and deploy for our customers is the plan.
Marc, how do you see it or how have you been involved? Yeah, it's been an amazing journey with DHL and I think it it shows two things. Number one is that DHL is really such an amazing partner for us because they realized that we needed to go on this journey together and build this robot together and build the specifications for robots like this.
And it also shows the deep research commitment that Boston Dynamics has and the heritage that we have in research. And, and the way that we approach building custom robots for these types of applications. So it's been an exciting, couple of years together, coming to this point where we now have a robot that is near its final production version, and seeing that deployed at DHL is really a dream come true for many of our engineers that have been working on this project for such a long time.
As you heard Marc say, it has been an exciting couple of years for our two companies. Listen to the rest of the episode to hear more about how we developed Stretch and future plans for the robot.
I’m going to sneak in another fan favorite from season 3…one of my personal favorites was a conversation we had with Lorraine Terry from JobsOhio Beverage System and Jason Rowe, VP of Operations for DHL Supply Chain. I love this episode because it speaks to the power of strong partnership and the incredible impact supply chain can have. Here’s a quick listen:
[6:23 – 10:00]
Take us back to 2017. What was the situation? What were you looking to accomplish and how did you guys wind up working together? Yeah, well, the situation was dumpster fire. and Ohio was in a state where we had four distribution centers, three different three plus, I think at the time, three different companies that were actually running the distribution and packaging our product.
There was an overhaul of the system. And we we all know in an overhaul of the of the technology platform does not go well. Things just, you know, fall apart. So good, bad or indifferent. Unfortunately, Ohio was in a state of not being able to track product very well, not being able to pay our suppliers very well for product, not being able to pay commission to our liquor stores the way that we are obligated to do so.
So fast forward to 2017. Brand new ERP goes into place. And with that shift in technology came a great opportunity to shift the way we distributed alcohol in Ohio. We jobs Ohio. Being a private nonprofit, we did a bid. We had a bid. We looked for vendors. We considered the existing as as part of that opportunity. But DHL just kind of roasted the top of the pile right, for their expertise, their longevity and the role of the three PL for being an Ohio based company.
So 2017 was just this great opportunity for change in Ohio, and we had the right leadership over both entities, both the division of liquor and at Jobs Ohio Beverage. We had the right leadership in place, great partnership, opportunity, incomes to each all at that time, and really just kind of a trifecta of of what we needed here in Ohio were a basement system, meaning that the product sitting in our warehouse is owned by the supplier who made it so Bacardi, Diageo, watershed here in Ohio bring their products to us and out on the floor here, they own that product.
So there's a lot of trust that we needed from DHL to say you'll care for that supplier's product. We jobs Ohio. There were to have a contract with that supplier and the contract with DHL to do just that. Care for that product, count the product to know where it all is and where it's sitting in our warehouse. And again, data was just the right fit for, for for bringing that level of accuracy and processing and whatnot we needed.
I’d recommend listening to that full episode – go back and bookmark it for your next flight or whenever you have some down time. It’s a great listen.
That brings me to season 4. In season 4, we welcomed guests from The Scott’s Miracle Gro Company, Zebra Technologies, Nokia, The American Red Cross and we even hosted our first journalist on the podcast – Lori Ann LaRocco from CNBC. One memorable episode for me from this season is our conversation with Robert Lindstrom, Director of Logistics for Glanbia and Tom Kimball from DHL Supply Chain. Robert walks us through their decision to transition supply chain management from an internal team to DHL Supply Chain. It’s a great story – let’s listen in:
[8:17-11:00]
I'm interested in this concept of first time outsourcing because I know lots of folks across the industry think about it.
And folks who are in saucers where they're doubts within Glanbia about doing that. And if so, what were they? Yeah, absolutely. Biggest piece of it, I think, was they can't do what we know. And how do you take all that institutional knowledge and transition it to a new team, you know, new systems, new providers. That was a big leap of faith.
And then as we went through that outsourcing assessment, that was such a big factor of why we landed with DHL. So you think about labor in the market. Definitely the king in the back yard that, you know, we were fighting for the same forklift drivers or talent in the market. You know, we were concerned about that. Could DHL then follow through on that or could our next three people follow through on sourcing all that?
We got it done that we didn't maybe do it right. But you know, we got it out the door and it worked to a lesser extent, changing to people that just didn't know the business. That was just the constant reoccurring conversation. And I think Tom led off with the fact that not only were we able to procure a five year agreement, but we actually kind of had a precursor agreement where we brought in who was going to be our general manager and a handful of f0 DHL folks to kind of assess and be able to learn those.
One of the biggest AHAs during the process was understanding the process. So at that time, I was in the business here for about six months and you ask a lot of questions and there's just an inherent thought that we do it well or that we know how we do it. And then when you get under the hood and you really ask some probing questions, the bad habits and inconsistencies have become the norm.
So it was really important that not only we find the right partner, but that they come in with us prior to see the old world, see how that institutional knowledge is transferring into the operation with the intent that with the knowledge, the know how the enhanced equipment, the better IT resources, you guys can take that and make it better for us, which needless to say happened time and time again here.
So it was, say, a leap of faith internally for the folks that came up through the organization. I came in at a time where I was very fortunate to have a lot of leadership that was coming from big CPG, that knew what that looked like. So we knew there was going to be growing pains. We knew there was going to be a lot of skeletons that were going to be found in the closets.
When we started really digging into, like, the guts of the operation and really understanding how we got it done. But I think quickly through the startup, it was very apparent that it was not only the right choice, you know, kind of in the short term here, but all those other steps that we made to kind of get the team on the floor and see the way that was done, I think built that trust beforehand, because now we had earlier working relationships, people that were now familiar names on a call or whatever the case may have been.
You know, we got a little bit of a jump start, but the teams that do the work with the employees that we were looking to retain, that was a big retention strategy of ours. So I think we quickly dulled any of those concerns that were just subjective. You know, folks hadn't really been, you know, through the weeds on these kind of transitions before or dealt with a world class provider that we had a lot of confidence in.
So, yeah, we had to kind of convince some of them, like, you just got to trust us and come along for the ride, and now they're the same ones banging on my door asking, what could we do next with DHL?
Hear the rest of the conversation as Robert and Tom discuss the partnership between Glanbia and DHL in the episode: It’s a Marathon, Not a Sprint: Ensuring Glanbia’s Supply Chain Can Go the Distance.
We’ve sure have covered a lot of ground in our first four seasons. Feel free to check out the episodes we just revisited or dive back into our past shows, there are a lot of great stories in there. Thanks for listening to All Business. No Boundaries. There’s so much more to come in season 5 and beyond. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts to stay up to date on the latest news, insights and supply chain trends. See you next time!