Supply Chain by the Numbers
   
 

- April 28, 2011

   
 

Supply Chain by the Numbers for Week of April 28, 2011

   
  Government to Block New Boeing Factory?  P&G says Commodity Costs Soaring; Stage Stores Sharply Reduces Problem Shipments; 35 Days and Counting on Gas Price Hikes
   
 
 
 

1000

Number of employees Boeing has pre-hired to staff its almost completed factory in South Carolina to build Dreamliner 787 aircraft, supplementing an existing production line near Seattle. But will it happen? In a shock to many, the National Labor Relations Board late last week filed a complaint against Boeing, saying it should move  production back to unionized facilities in Washington, versus the non-union factory near Charleston. Wow. (See National Labor Relations Board On March, Seeking to Block Boeing Factory Move and Challenging State Bans on Card Check.)

 
 



 
 
 

300%

Rise in expected input and commodity costs consumer products giant Procter & Gamble is now forecasting for the fiscal year versus what it had estimated previously, according to CFO Jon Moeller in P&G's Q1 earnings call this week. P&G now says commodity costs will increase $1.8 billion this year, three times the $600 million estimate it had forecast last quarter, forcing it to reduce earnings estimates a bit and announce it was accelerating supply chain cost cutting moves.

 
 
 
 
 
35

Number of consecutive days that average gas prices in the US had risen through Wednesday of this week, to an average of $3.87 per gallon, with many areas suffering prices well above that. While we could not find a similar metric for diesel fuel, it has to be close. The bigger issue is the toll this rise in fuel costs will have on the economy.

 
 
 
 
 

30%

 

Percent of shipments that had issues and could not be easily processed in the flow-through distribution centers of department store chain Stage Stores (Stage Stores, Peebles, etc.) before it started its Vendor Compliance program, according to Gough Grubbs, SVP of Logistics and Distribution this week. The comments were made during a Videocast this week on Vendor Compliance 101. The number of problems shipments is now down to a small percentage now, Grubbs said. To view the broadcast, go to Vendor Compliance 101 - The Basics.

 
 
 
 
 
 
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