Lean distribution principles to food logistics: a product category approach

In today's industrial reality distribution network optimisation is one of the most crucial topics and in particular, supply chain management (SCM), is widely studied and discussed. SCM plays an even more critical role within the food industry network, where, both on the manufacturer's/wholesaler's side and the retailer's side, the margins are continuously decreasing and the competition is fierce. How convenient is it to manage the deliveries, inside a food distribution network, with according to customer demand, regarding frequency/quantity? Is it possible and efficient to satisfy the demand with direct deliveries with multi products pallets? These and other relevant questions have inspired this paper together with the desire to integrate the lean principles (pull philosophy, value maximisation, waste elimination, etc.) into an innovative SCM approach based on a linear programming model that focuses on one products category at the time, on its logistic characteristics and on the specific food supply chain (SC) features. To test the proposed model, a real application in a food SC is presented and a sensitive analysis of the lean‐keys factors is developed.