1. what other solutions would you recommend to further improve their supply chain?

A Managed Transportation Solution for a National Produce Customer The Challenge In the produce supply chain, temperature-sensitivity, short shelf-life and seasonal unpredictability make shipping a challenge. It is of the utmost importance that produce arrives to the end consumer on-time and undamaged, but the reality is that not all produce suppliers have the operational strength to handle the strict requirements. For one Capstone produce partner, communication and visibility issues led to long dwell times, high carrier turnover, and stagnant growth. One major pain point was the partner's lack of visibility on inbound product from Mexico. In some cases, communication lapses caused trucks to wait upwards of four days for cross border product, severely impacting dwell time and reducing overall profit. A second pain point for the partner was the high number of brokers in their network. With too many brokers working on the same business, demand for capacity increases beyond supply. This cannibalization of capacity tightens the marketing and increases outbound prices. The third major pain point was the decentralized structure of the partner's operations. Each division utilized their own carrier network, which resulted in a missed opportunity for improved pricing and deeper relationships with carrier partners across all divisions. Customer Profile: A produce marketing company based in Los Angeles, California providing a variety of fresh products to stores across the U.S. Project Snapshot: Capstone worked with a produce shipper as their Managed Transportation Partner to reduce dwell time, and losses and create a more streamlined assetfocused network. CASE STUDY Companies that employ advanced supply chain management practices are approximately 40% more profitable, have 1 to 2% advantage in total supply chain costs, and experience YOY decreases in COGS as a percentage of Rev, opposed to others experiencing YOY increases." " -Supply Chain Management Review, April 2004 Scott Hadley, Management Business Case Solutions at a Glance Network Optimization Shipper of Choice Reliable Produce Network Best-inClass Visibility Risk Mitigation Issue Resolution The Solution To address these operational challenges, the customer looked to Capstone Logistics to be their fully outsourced Managed Transportation partner. In this role, Capstone analyzed their supply chain and implemented tailored solutions that helped our partner become a Shipper of Choice. Key Metrics. Capstone worked with the partner to determine key metrics to hold vendors accountable. These metrics include OTD%, rejection %, time from rejection notification to re-delivery, and dwell time at shipper and receiver. Personnel Management. With the partner, we worked to improve operational processes in terms of personnel and implemented a dedicated team with boots on the ground during peak season. Transparency. We enforced full transparency from the partner on what was bought, including all carrier rates and margins. Streamlined Operations. We deployed our best-in-class processes in their network, providing end-to-end supply chain guidance. To reduce broker exposure, we filtered out poor performers to find better service-oriented carriers and created an integrated carrier network to use across all divisions. Through continuous improvement analysis, we looked at their full processes, identified bottlenecks, improved efficiencies, and provided data-driven analysis. Introduced our Proprietary Technology. Using LoadDex, we created a custom platform that collected and connected data from all divisions to create efficiencies. The Results After implementing Capstone's recommendations and services, our partner reduced dwell times. This improvement helped make them a more attractive partner for their carrier network. It has also motivated them to onboard more new customers; they know they can trust Capstone to handle their freight, so they feel comfortable taking on more business. Read about more improvements in the boxed section below: