Packaging Material Inventory Management as a Tool Increasing the Level of Customers Services in the the B2B Market

Abstract

In the current highly competitive environment, it is more and more difficult for companies to differentiate physical products. This is why in the last decades companies have been reacting to the growing competition by offering additional services and customized solutions. Services play an important role in creation and maintenance not only of customer satisfaction, but also of customer loyalty, and they are becoming one of the deciding areas of acquiring competitive advantages. An important role is played by services connected with delivery. Their basic components are reliability and completeness of deliveries, and adequately short delivery times. It is also necessary to take account of competitive prices. To meet these requirements, it is essential to cooperate across the entire supply chain, especially in the area of sharing information about customer requirements. However, if any of the entities is not willing to share information, suppliers cover the requirements of their customers using their inventory. This paper deals with the problem of pallet inventory management as a part of transport packaging for a pulp and paper company with respect to fulfilment of customer requirements concerning supplier services and more even utilization of production capacities. The paper presents the outcomes of the performed analysis of the current management of orders and pallet deliveries, and a proposal of a new method of their management through optimization of their inventory management. The outcomes were achieved through directed research, the method of directed interviewing, statistical data analysis, and a modified ABC method for differentiated inventory management.