SCM MIDTERM

 Supply chain distribution refers to

the industries' methodology for getting products to consumers.

Distribution

is the process of making a product or service available for the consumer or business user who needs it

Distribution Requirements Planning (DRP)

is the process of determining the right quality of finished goods to be sent to each distribution center or warehouse in order to meet customer demand.

Demand Variability

refers to the measure of how much variability there is in demand.

Pull method

involves demands for finished goods shifting upward throughout the system to fulfil customer orders.

Push method 

goods are sent downward through the system.

Online travel agents

OTAs are third-party sites which hotels can list their rooms to be sold. For each booking that is made, the OTA will take some of the reservation fee as commission.

Hotel website and social media pages

the real booking channel for these is an online booking engine, which enables travellers to book directly with hotels on website.

Metasearch engine

takes a user’s query and produces aggregated results from many other data sources.

Global distribution system

It is a worldwide conduit between travel bookers and suppliers, such as hotels and other accommodation providers.

Wholesalers

These are third parties who source hotel room nights in bulk at heavily discounted rates and sell them, at a mark-up, to travel agents and OTAs.

Tour operators

typically at a discount, the individual components of a holiday—flights, transfers, hotels, meals, guides and activities—and sell the combined package direct to travelers or through OTAs and wholesalers.

Destination marketing organizations (DMOs)-

are typically governmental organizations, including tourism boards and visitors bureaus, responsible for promoting travel and tourism to and within a destination.

Offline

Don’t overlook off-line channels for distribution.

Supply chain network planners

Their job is to evaluate complex tradeoffs among supply chain components, maximizing profits and minimizing costs within the limits of relevant constraints and intangible considerations.

Supply Chain Contracts

are agreement between buyer and supplier on issues like Pricing and volume discounts.

A hotel management contract

is a legally binding agreement between the hotel owner and the management firm

Wholesale price contract

There is one supplier and a retailer. 

Retailer’s View:

The retailer wants to maximize its own profit. 

Supplier’s View:

The supplier wants to maximize its own profit. 

System’s View:

The system wants to maximize the overall profit.

Buy-back Contract

The contract is specified by three parameters (q, w, b), where b > s.

Revenue-sharing Contract

The contract is specified by three parameters (q, w, ϕ), where ϕ > w p .

Quantity-flexibility Contract:

The contract is specified by three parameters (q, w, δ).

Sales-rebate Contract:

The contract is specified by four parameters (q, w, r, t).

Quantity-discount Contract:

The contract is specified by parameters (q, w(q)).

Fixed Price Contracts

These contracts, which are also known as lump sum agreements, are the most effective in containing costs when the scope is well-defined.

Cost Reimbursable Contracts

The purpose of these agreements is to keep the parties on schedule and under budget.

Purchase Orders

These contracts are frequently used to outline the contractual arrangement between a business and its vendor and to establish the obligations of each.

Time & Materials Contracts

In this arrangement, the risk is distributed between both parties.

Global Supply Chain Management

  It  refers to all processes regarding a product’s lifecycle, from the concept of its creation to distribution to endpoints.

Global Supply Chain?

is made up of the interrelated organizations, resources, and processes that create and deliver products and services to end customers.

 Internet Of Things

is a buzzword of the recent decade or even more. Technology is rapidly developing along with the expansion of its use cases.

AI And ML

the applications of breaking through techs like Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning are vast.

Accurate And Fast Decision Making

 Big trucking carriers usually have to handle thousands of repetitive and complicated tasks requiring a lot of input data to make the right selection.

     Autonomous Vehicles

Vendor of autonomous carriers TuSimple revealed their plans to bring driverless trucks to market by 2024.

Drones For Last-Mile Deliveries

he pandemic has added value to contactless activities.

Blockchain

smart contracts available with Blockchain streamline the complicated logistics processes that generally involve several third-parties because of distrust among stakeholders in the transaction.

Financial accounting system

The financial accounting department of a hotel needs to keep a track of all the transactions to make better decisions. However, the tasks aren’t simple as it involves a lot of math and data.

Point-of-Sale (POS) system

 A hotel business also includes multiple point-of-sale (POS) outlets such as spa, restaurant, bar etc.

Housekeeping module

  The prime purpose of an integrated housekeeping module is to streamline the tasks by bridging the communication gap.

Channel Manager

 When you sell rooms on multiple booking channels, you always need to keep an eye on your inventory.

 channel manager

integrated with your hotel PMS allows you to update your room inventory, rates, and packages in real-time, helping you avoid issues like double booking and rate disparity. 

Booking Engine

 is your key to commission-free, direct bookings. However, not every hotel believes in its integration. 

Contactless Hospitality

Simply put, when the contactless solution is integrated into the existing system, the process of capturing data gets automated.

Payment Gateway

When you have a payment gateway integrated with your hotel PMS, you can significantly speed up your check-in/check-out and billing processes.

Customer relationship management (CRM) system

 To run effective marketing campaigns, hotels must have a good number of guests’ data. 

Revenue management tool

plays a vital role in your hotel’s overall revenue. But it involves complex math and there is a scope of error if the right set of data isn’t available.

Review management tool

  A lot of people read reviews and decide whether to book with your hotel.

The Push System

In a push-based supply chain, the goods are pushed with the help of a medium, from the source point, e.g., the production site, to the retailer, e.g., the destination site.

The Pull System

is based on demand-driven techniques; the procurement, production and distribution are demand-driven rather than predicting.

Internal integration

 involves the coordination, collaboration and integration of logistics activities with other functional areas in an organization. 

External integration

requires the integration of logistics activities with those of their customer and suppliers in the supply chain (Stock et al, 1998).

quantitative forecasting method

is used when there is existing historical sales data on specific products and a pre-established demand. It requires the use of mathematical formulations and data sets like financial reports, sales, revenue figures, and website analytics.

qualitative method,

 relies on emerging technologies, pricing and availability changes, product lifecycle, product upgrades and, most importantly the intuition and experience of those planning the forecast.

Demand forecasting

is valuable to all businesses but is particularly useful to e-commerce brands and retailers, where accurate forecasting can support inventory management efforts and improve the customer experience.

Operational forecast:

staff-based decisions, such as number of receptionists needed on a particular day, number of tables required in the restaurant, etc.

Financial forecast

to determine end of fiscal results and set financial goals accordingly

Revenue management forecast

the goal is to determine the hotel's future demand in order to set the strategy to maximize revenue.

Collective Opinion,

which leverages the knowledge and experience of a company’s sales team to aggregate historical data on customer demand.

Customer Survey Method

which provide key information on customer expectations, desires, and needs.

The Barometric Method

which involves using economic indicators to predict trends and measure current, past and future activity.

The Expert Opinion Method

which involves soliciting expert advice from external contractors to determine future activity.

The Market Experiment Method

which utilizes market experiments carried out under controlled conditions to inform retailers on consumer behavior.

The Statistical Method

which allows a company to identify and analyze the relationships between different variables; establish performance history over time, identify trends and extrapolate potential future trends.

Hyperlocal Forecasting 

     One hotel brand is likely to have multiple hotels in multiple locations across one city.

Recovery Forecasting

ithms enable hotels to start the vital process of recovery forecasting.

Quality Checks

Labor demand forecasting algorithms are equipped with automatic quality checks and corresponding retraining to ensure that forecasts are not only accurate on the data set it is trained on now

Basic forecasting model 

is one of the simplest forecasting models and one which involves the least calculation.

Advanced forecasting model

Model is a bit more complex. While you use the market trends as before, instead of using the hotel’s historical data, you need to focus on the information by segment.

Forecasting Techniques

it might seem intimidating, but from an operational point of view, forecasting is crucial.