When the world started to run short on essential goods last year, the finger-pointing soon followed—and many of those digits were being directed at companies’ just-in-time (JIT) manufacturing and distribution processes. For decades, it seems, these organizations had been operating with fairly lean inventories centered on stocking as little as possible while still being able to meet customer demand.
Empty grocery store shelves during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic forced some companies to rethink their lean approaches and make changes. The supply chain disruption and raw material shortages that subsequently emerged—and that haven’t let up yet—pushed even more organizations to take introspective looks at their inventorying strategies and adjust for the times.
