Bringing order [replenishment process control]

The importance of replenishment management in "make to stock" businesses is often overlooked in demand management studies in favour of forecast management. The real issue in replenishment strategy is addressing the fundamental challenge between holding enough inventory to protect future sales versus reducing inventory to reduce costs and enhance productivity. It is likely that replenishment lead-time will be greater than is desirable, vendors will be unreliable and forecasts will in most cases be wrong. Thus, in this paper, the author urges manufacturers to take control of the replenishment process.