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The supply chain (SC) of the fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) sector in India witnessed a significant change soon after introducing the Goods and Services Tax (GST). With the initiation of this tax, companies started moving from individual state-wise warehouses to consolidation warehouses model to save costs. This paper proposes a model that frames a mathematical formulation to optimize the distribution network in the downstream SC by considering the complexities of multi-product lines, multi-transport modes and consolidated warehouses.

The model is designed as mixed-integer linear programming (MILP), and an algorithm is developed that works on the feedback loop mechanism. It optimizes the transportation and warehouses rental costs simultaneously with impact analysis.

Total cost is primarily influenced by the critical factor transportation price rather than the warehouse rent. The choice of warehouses at prime locations was a trade-off between a lower distribution cost and higher rent tariffs.

The study enables FMCG firms to plan their downstream SC efficiently and to be in line with the recent trend of consolidation of warehouses. The study will help SC managers solve complexities such as multi-product categories, truck selection and consolidation warehouse selection problems and find the optimum value for each.

The issues addressed in the proposed work are transporting products with different sizes and weights, selecting consolidated warehouses, selecting suitable vehicles for transportation and optimizing distance in the distribution network by considering consolidated warehouses.

Freight consolidation across time and customers, use of warehouses, and direct LTL distribution systems are compared on distribution costs and delivery times for selected product characteristics and demand patterns. The results can assist managers in determining whether using freight consolidation is a viable alternative to direct shipments from plants or warehouses.

Information-sharing and flexibility are considered to be major tools for risk mitigation and supply chain resiliency. However, less light has been shed on the role of information-sharing as an enabler to utilize flexibility capabilities before and after supply chain disruptions. The aim of this paper is to provide indications on how digitalized information-sharing (DIS) enhances flexibility capability utilization.

The methodology follows a qualitative approach, including 31 transcribed semi-structured interviews with supply chain experts in Germany and Japan.

The findings indicate that DIS supports flexibility capability utilization in pre- and post-disruptive supply chain management. First, the enhancement of estimated transport time accuracy supports rapid supplier and transport mode adjustment. Second, while the effects of DIS in manufacturing are limited without pre-existing flexibility capabilities, steady internal and external DIS utilizes exciting manufacturing flexibility to cope with disruptions beyond production. Third, track and trace technologies enhance the value of shared data and allow flexibility in the form of demand-oriented distribution, but companies unable to adopt technologies can still enhance flexibility capabilities with DIS using the existing infrastructure.

This paper highlights the essential role of digital information-sharing for flexibility utilization in supply chain risk management. While existing studies engaged with flexibility and information-sharing in supply chain risk management, this study contributes by emphasizing digital information-sharing as a key triggering enabler for flexibility in pre- and post-disruptive phases.

Data warehousing is the technological trend for the corporate decision support process. This article investigates the current business environment of the data warehouse, including OLAP, data mining, data visualization and other technologies. This article also analyzes the importance of data warehouse management and maintenance and its future developments.

Warehousing remains the most frequently outsourced logistics activity, but empirical research on the third‐party selection process for warehousing remains scarce. The main goals of this research were to identify the most critical factors to customers during third‐party warehousing selection and to compare the perceived performance levels of national and regional third‐party firms on each of the selection criteria. Surveys were sent to warehousing customers in several industries. Responsiveness to service needs, quality of management, and track record of ethical importance were rated by customers as the most important selection criteria. Results indicate that respondents also rated the performance of the typical regional third‐party warehousing firm as significantly better than national firms on six different criteria while national firms were rated significantly higher on only one criterion. It is hoped that this research can provide guidance to logistics managers as they evaluate third‐party warehousing options.

For library service, bibliomining is concisely defined as the data mining techniques used to extract patterns of behavior‐based artifacts from library systems. The bibliomining process includes identifying topics, creating a data warehouse, refining data, exploring data and evaluating results. The cases of practical implementations and applications in different areas have proved that the properly enough and consolidated data warehouse is the critical promise to successful data mining applications. However, the data warehouse creation in the processing of various data sources obviously hampers librarians to apply bibliomining to improve their services and operations. Moreover, most market data mining tools are even more complex for librarians to adopt bibliomining. The purpose of this paper is to propose a practical application model for librarian bibliomining, then develop its corresponding data processing prototype system to guarantee the success of applying data mining in libraries.

The rapid prototyping software development method was applied to design a prototype bibliomining system. In order to evaluate the effectiveness of the system, there was a comparison experiment of accomplishing an assigned task for 15 librarians.

With the results of system usability scale (SUS) comparison and turn‐around time analysis, it was established that the proposed model and the developed prototype system can really help librarians handle bibliomining applications better.

The proposed novel application bibliomining model and its developed integration system are proved to be effective and efficient in bibliomining by the task‐oriented experiment and SUS to 15 librarians. Comparing turn‐around time to accomplish the assigned task, about 35 per cent in terms of time was saved. Librarians really require an appropriate integration tool to assist them in successful bibliomining applications.

Visualise a company with 10,000 product items and several warehousing levels in its physical distribution channel. If this company is typical, it is not likely to stock all 10,000 items at all warehouses. But which items should be stocked at which warehouses? Fortunately, there are at least some generalised concepts for dealing with this question. Unfortunately, concepts alone do not make a workable methodology. This article is directed toward extending these generalised concepts into an easy, efficient procedure that a firm can use to provide optimum or near optimum solutions to its stock location problems.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a theoretical framework to better understand incentives and obstacles to consolidation of materials in humanitarian logistics.

This study uses a content analysis for its literature review method to code 87 articles related to supply chain and logistics and understand what are the incentives and obstacles to consolidation. It then discusses these issues from the point of view of humanitarian logistics.

Through the combination of a literature review and discussion, the framework developed in this conceptual paper identifies specific sources of delays and impediments to cooperation present in disaster response and development activities. These issues can be related to disaster type, the focus of the organization and the stakeholders as well as the resources required for consolidation themselves.

There are limitations to a conceptual paper, one being the lack of empirical proof for the findings. Another limitation is the use of coding; even though the coding grid was iterative to take into account the findings in the literature, there might still be shortcomings inherent to the categories.

This study offers a comprehensive review of consolidation activities in the last decades and offers an abstract model to further investigate consolidation in the context of humanitarian logistics.

A large number of firms have reconfigured their supply chains. The general trends entail, among others, the reduction, centralization and re‐location of plants and distribution centers, the design of new distribution systems, and the reduction of the supplier base. The analysis of the implications of such reconfiguration for freight transport has received comparatively little attention, and most of the analysis has focused on the development of different theoretical models showing how changes in logistic structures and decisions could affect the transport demand. Using empirical data from Denmark, this paper sheds some light on the implications of reconfiguration supply chains on transport. Industry mail surveys among Danish firms as well as an in‐depth case study were performed. The consequences of the reconfiguration process on the present and future demand for transport are measured and analyzed in terms of the quantity of transport units used (trucks/containers), and the transport‐work (ton/km).

This is a statement of just how much change warehousing has undergone in recent years and how different warehouse requirements are now. Companies which fail to realise these changes and to analyse and evaluate their own warehousing stock are at risk of losing their competitive position.