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Web-based system keeps the supply chain visible
By Shelia Watson
Contributing Writer
Charleston-based Shippers Commonwealth has contracted with Graphic Packaging Corp., headquartered in Marietta, Ga., for a transportation management system that will provide not only cost savings but real-time Web visibility for Graphic Packaging’s shipments.
Lori Kesten, director of sales and marketing for Shippers Commonwealth, said mainly Fortune 1000 companies use the firm’s system to manage movement of their goods around the country and around the world.
The transportation management system used by Graphic Packaging will be implemented in phases at the company’s paper mills and carton-converting plants. The management system allows the company to track its shipments online.
“We have what we call ‘on-demand’ transportation planning and management systems that our customers can access on the Web,” said Kesten. “That’s part of what makes it so visible.”
Visibility is key in managing a supply chain and requires information that is readily accessible in real time, Kesten said.
Web visibility also means the information can be shared company wide in any office, which is crucial for collaboration. The system also provides an analytical framework for decision making.
“This system saves money by taking the unnecessary cost out of the equation,” Kesten said. “When a company is ordering goods from vendors and suppliers, they use our system to manage the movement of goods, and it can help them decide whether it should go on rail or truck to find the best cost savings.
“Once that decision is made, the system communicates with the carriers that this particular company needs to move goods from point A to point B. This is the execution part of the supply chain, the actual movement of goods, and it’s showing real-time information.”
The execution phase, she said, is where most of the human-system interaction takes place.
“As much as everyone would like to think everything’s global, that all systems are global, there’s still a physical hand-off of goods that needs to happen,” she said. “We know we’re working toward a future where there will be less and less hand-off, but today there’s a need to know that the information you have is reliable.”
Kesten said the transportation management system focuses primarily on one key area of the supply chain: tracking shipments.
“In the supply chain, there’s a lot of forecasting and demand planning for everything from orders to consumption, and all of that is important,” she said. “But our system takes over when the order is placed and the goods need to move. What we bring to the table is this ability to know what’s in transit and when it’ll get there.”
A visible supply-chain solution such as the TMS often can be set up using technologies that are readily available, and in some cases already installed, or can replace complete systems.
For instance, Graphic Packaging did its homework before selecting Shippers
Commonwealth’s management system. The requirements were for a comprehensive supply-chain solution with a high return on investment that would replace or enhance the company’s current and antiquated system across its large-scale, multi-site shipping network. In this case, the TMS replaces both the current system and previous third-party logistics systems that had been installed.
Robert Pierce, Graphic Packaging’s corporate director of transportation and logistics, said the company chose the TMS based on its capabilities in large-scale manufacturing transportation programs in that industry.
Other companies have found Shippers Commonwealth’s TMS to be effective in providing visibility, including Alcoa, Sonoco, Four Seasons, Energizer and Jeld-Wen, among others.
Shippers Commonwealth relocated its headquarters from Richmond, Va., to Charleston last November, a move that Kesten said underscored the capabilities of a real-time, Web-based system.
“We tend to serve global companies, so we truly can be anywhere on the globe,” she said. “Our CEO picked Charleston because, (since) we can be anywhere, why not be somewhere like Charleston? This seemed like a nice natural fit for where we want to be in regards to the shipper community.
“Even though our solution deals primarily with ground movement and not so much with ocean transportation, we like that there’s a port here and a fair amount of commerce going on here.”
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