Problem Statement

Low-margin consumer goods with highly seasonal demand profiles make it impossible for manufacturing companies to operate warehouses at capacity levels that would cover the peak levels, which only occur in foreseeable, short periods during the year (e.g. summer time, major public holidays like Christmas, Easter etc.).

This leads to the requirement to rent overflow warehouses (WH) and raises several questions: where and with what capacity should the WH be; how should the in- and outbound supply routes to this temp location look like; which products should be stocked there (to avoid a truck stopping twice, at main and overflow WHs, to get loaded); for how long should that location be rented?

Solution Statement

With a Sophus supply chain model, you can answer all of the above at once and assess the total impact of the additional site on your end-to-end network, instead of analyzing individual aspects of such decision step by step and thereby arriving at grossly suboptimal conclusions that deteriorate the performance of your supply chain and your customer service.