How visibility can supercharge your supply chain

February 11, 2022
By Heath Hazard | VP of Sales

When it comes to opportunities in your supply chain, my belief is that visibility is critical. This is because anyone who’s interested in creating sustainable success needs to be able to see and adjust to changes in the supply chain.

Visibility is all about analytics.

Being able to study and understand the patterns or trends that will help you navigate and avoid any obstacles the supply chain throws at you, as well as position your organization to capitalize on opportunities.

Bottom line: Instead of being reactive, visibility to data points allows you to become proactive. In some cases, even predictive.

Here are three common challenges our clients share with us:

• Frustrated by the lack of visibility into parts usage or spend.
• Discouraged with not having reporting mechanisms to capture data points.
• Challenged by not having historical.

Let’s look at each of these quickly:

• Parts usage or spend. If you don’t know where your inventory or capital is going, you have a problem.
• Capturing data. Often even when a team can analyze their data, it takes too long to collect and organize the information to be beneficial in making decisions.
  
• Historical data. This one is easy to overlook. Without it, you have no way to benchmark your progress.  

Supply chain awareness
Do any of these sound familiar? Do you feel improved visibility could benefit your supply chain? If they do, consider a strategic partnership. This isn't about simply adding a new vendor; this is about creating an entirely new level of supply chain awareness.
 
When you engage on the level of a strategic partnership, it involves collaboration and holding each other accountable to reach your goals together.

If it's the right supplier, you will be able to leverage their expertise and resources (like automated technology). From industrial vending machines to inventory stocking locations that use RFID or Infra-red technology to avoid outages, these solutions are designed to improve your productivity and supply chain.

Ideally, your partner will be able to offer an e-business platform that provides you visibility into real-time inventory levels across multiple locations.

The takeaway
Should you decide to move forward, be sure to leverage the data points created by the automated solutions to provide true visibility into your supply chain.

Once you have that next level of supply chain awareness, it will empower you to mitigate risk, increase profits, and ultimately focus on doing more of what your organization does best.

You may also like:

How a Strategic Partnership Can Help Streamline Your Operation

Getting Lean: Experts Share Tips You Can Use

Why Strategic Partnerships are a Better Value Than Low-Cost Supply Chain Models

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If you are interested in engaging with someone to challenge your existing supply chain, just reach out to me at hhazard@fastenal.com.

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