Supply Chain Manangement

Supply Chain

Since CarID is a dropoff business, our supply chain is a bit different, but each vendor/manufacture has roughly the same supply chain. Each manufacture gets their products from their source, whether its plastic to steal and from glass to diamonds. From their it goes to the sorting facility where they break down the raw materials and distribute to all the manufactures where they start the manufacture process of the products. Each facility gets the raw materials, and start the build process of all the items. Once the items are complete, they are shipped to the vendor. Some items do not ship to vendors, and the manufacture is the vendor. From the vendor it gets packaged and shipped to the customer.

Delivery

Since Alot of the items are manufactured in bulk, the delivery time from the sorting facility to the manufacturing facility is not so important. Everything is made in bulk and the vendors have enough stock in each warehouse to meet the demand. Sometimes we run into backorders, but it is very rare.

Quality

The Quality of each item is hand picked. We only use certain grades of steel, aluminum, plastic, rubber, etc. Depending on the items depends on the certain grade of raw material is used to make that product to meet the standards of the customers.

Time

The time that the items take for the manufacturing time can be anywhere from 10 days all the way to 5 months. Some of our items take less time then others to get manufactured. Floor mats can take about 10 days to make. Certain steel and plastic items can take anywhere up to 5 months from the time the raw materials are sourced to the time it is in the vendor's hands.

Cost

The cost of each product is determined by the detail and the production time of the item. Everytime the product flows, the price increases a bit so each company can make their money. By the time it reaches us, we sell it at jobber cost, which means the cost that the customer pays for the item. This cost is usually double the cost of what we pay minus 20 percent.

Recomendations

I recommend CarID being more aware of the flow from raw materials to when it comes into our hands. Alot of the times, our vendors tell us one thing which is not necessarily true. Most of the times we do not know where the merchandise is and this can be a problem because if we have to wait, then our customers have to wait, and this can be a problem.

Project Scheduling

Project: Open a new Warehouse

Based out of New York, CarId was a small office, with at most 3 rooms. Then Relocated to Edison, NJ and had an office of about 12 rooms, and a small warehouse. Now, in the works, is a huge warehouse facility, a little bit over 100 yards long, and 80 yards wide. Instead of house about 2% of our product, we will be housing about 50-60% of our products that we sell. This will cut shipping time down and we will have more accurate answers if items are in stock or not.

Task: Site Selection

The area in which we built the new warehouse is in an area that is close to NY, and cheap for all the bills. This area is only 15 min longer drive from Edison, NJ. It is a very good location for all the workers to drive, and it is a very large warehouse, which will benefit us.

Tasks: Construction

The construction for this warehouse was about 9 months, and is near complete. It does not have to appear nice to customers since everything is getting shipped to them. This has the necesities that any worker needs.

Gantt bar charts:

Gantt bar charts are used in retail project management with a specific focus of choosing the correct project delivery approach, assembling the right project team, tackling contract issues and negotiations, and scheduling.

Supply Chain Management

CarID's supply chain starts with its vendors, because they buy directly from their vendors. We only carry about 2% of what we sell in our warehouse. Everything comes from our vendors and gets sent direct to the customer.
Delivery: CarID has on-time delivery, because they guarantee the customer that the product will be at their house in 3 to 7 business days. Customers get a tracking number which will tell them the exact day they will be recieving the product.

Quality: CarID is well known for our customer service and customer satisfaction. Our customers have high expectations and they recieve the quality they are looking for in their products. When the products get to the customer, the customers check the product to see if it is what they are expecting. If it is not what they are expecting, they have 30 days to return the product, no questions asked.

Time: The total supply chain throughput time is the supplier, the manufacture, the packer, then the shipper.

Cost: The vendors have a specific wholesale price in which they sell their products at. We then pay that cost for the products, but we sell it to our consumers for the price that we think the market will pay for it, which is usually double the cost of what we get it for minus 20%.

Quality Control

Quality control methods

The quality control methods CarID currently utilizes is TQM. This stands for Total Quality Management. This allows CarID to oversee business and process analysis, defective products and problem solving which will increase the quality and customer satisfaction. This is very cost effective because allows us to see what parts have to be fixed before it gets to the customer. If we oversee the product, and it gets to the customer deffective, we have a unhappy customer and a problem that we now have to solve which we could have solved in the begging.

Quality Control charts

CarID can monitor process data with a variety of control charts. CarID can reuse control limits created during a previous analysis, automatically adjust control limits for simalar items and also its new items that are to come.

Types of inspections

At CarID, vendors are responsible for shipping first quality merchandise. Before anything is shipped, all items are inspected and tested. To keep the process fairly simple to do, the stockrooms are inspected to make sure they are clean and uncluttered, and that the items are rotated so the last one goes first.

Fishbone Diagrams



CarID utilizes the fishbone diagram. If something is not correct, they go through all the areas in making a problem to see where the problem originates from. This is the best way to get a problem solved. Some problems are easier to fix then others, but most are solved with this process.

Six Sigma practices



The Six Sigma certification is preferred for quality control analysist. Unfortunatly we do not practice this because this is too costly and sometimes is not worth the money spent to complete the Six Sigma. If an item is not functiona, it is more cost effective to just replace it with another one. Most of the items are made overseas and to have a six sigma practive overseas is not worth it.

Managing Quality

CarID.com was built on the principles of quality, value, selection and service. The quality has to be the best, if it is not, then we have many items getting returned. The value has to be good, without a good value on an item, customers will not buy the products from us and will look elsewhere for the same product. The selection of items that we sell are hand picked. We do not sell anything that we will not use on our own vehicle. The service that we provide has to be the best, customer service is the key into our business because many customers do not feel comfortable purchasing items on line and we have to make them feel as if they are making a good choice.

Each product at Carid.com falls under quality of conformance and goes through a vigorous process making sure that each product meets the customer's expectations. Our products are made to a certain type of quality . CarID.com sells nothing but high quality automotive accessories and we stay behind our product 100%.

CarID.com has had tremendous success satisfying our customers. We have moved to a bigger location to house more of the products in stock. This will entail faster delivery and better customer satisfaction. We can keep a proper count of product in stock and we can tell customers if the item is in stock or not. We can also track each product to inform the customer better on the status of their order. Our hours have elongated due to the call volume that we see come in. We are open for about 12 hours a day, and 8 hours on Saturday and Sunday.

We are known for the reliability of our products. Our products are some of the highest quality products on the market right now. If there is any reason to believe that something has a problem, then we either have life time warranty or about a 3 year warranty for some items. We are a very successful company because of the items that we sell. Customers keep coming back to us because they trust our products and services that we supply to them.

Some new ideas that i have for the company would be to hire more of the customer service department. Our customer service department is great, but not enough of them working. Sometimes customers can hold on the line up to a half hour. Alot of customers get annoyed, but there is so many of them at the same time that call. Adding a few more people to the staff will dramatically decrease the amount of time that customer stay on hold, and instead of rushing through each customer, the customer service reps will have more time to spend with each of the customers and their questions and concerns.

The six sigma program that some companies are trying to use is a good idea, but also very expensive to maintain. Our business is too large, and alot of the products are custom made, so having a six sigma program in our business is very hard to achieve. We try to have the least amount of problems, or errors in the business and our products, but since we work with so many vendors, and we drop ship most of the accessories, then we would have to have each of these vendors in the six sigma program in order for us to even qualify for. The six sigma would be an outstanding goal to be accomplished, but in a business like this, it is nearly impossible to do.

The 3 elements of the service-product bundle

The 3 elements of the service-product bundle is Explicit Service, Implicit service, and Facilitating. The Explicit Service that we offer are the trained employees, the website wich is very user friendly and really easy to use, and the hold music when a customer is on hold on the phone, its very funny and exciting. The Implicit Service is to have the customer comming back for more business. We achieve this by being great on the phone and have a funny sales staff which entertain and joke around with the customers while they are purchasing products. This helps the customer get comfortable with us and haveing that certain trust in us. Facilitating the customer is achieved by the tv that we have in our lobby, the comfortable couches, the very expensive wooden front desk.

The cell that CarID operates in on the service matrix is customer routed service. CarID is in this service matrix because since this is an online business, customers are always calling out customer service, sales, and shipping department for assistance. We have trained employees to help customers through any of their needs and wants. CarID has a low contact process, which would be the online website. The high contact is that the customers are already in our system that we use. If they previously purchased from CarID, we have them in the system and we can pull up their account information. This system is called quickbooks.

CarID has great service guarantees and service recovery. We have a 30 day money back guarentee and we take back any product they sell to you, as long as you have stay within the return policy. CarID also has a warentee system, which will replace or repair the merchendise that we sold to them. Alot of our products are life time warrentees. If their item malfunctions, or rusts within the vehicles lifetime, we will replace it for free.

Inventory Management

At CarID.com, the items in our warehouse do not have a set inventory standard. The shipping clerk is the person who checks the stock and keeps an eye on when the stock is running low and when more stock has to be ordered. There is no inventory control, for example, if an item is lost or stolen from the warehouse, there is no way to trace it or catch the person who may have stolen the item. There is no cameras in the warehouse to catch theives, but CarID.com relies on the trust of their employees to keep the warehouse and inventory in control and away from the theives.

Most of the items that are stored in the warehouse are large, so it is very hard to walk out with any of the items. Smaller items have close to no value and if one or two of the items are missing, the company will not suffer. Everything in the warehouse is kept in order, and everything is labeled. This makes it easier to find items and have the items shipped out very fast and efficiently. If the warehouse was not in this order, there would be a mess everywhere and it would make the job of shipping these items harder for the shipper.