It's not every day that you see someone appointed to head up both information technology and the supply chain. But then, Danny Garst isn't exactly your everyday professional.
Mitch Mac Donald has more than 30 years of experience in both the newspaper and magazine businesses. He has covered the logistics and supply chain fields since 1988. Twice named one of the Top 10 Business Journalists in the U.S., he has served in a multitude of editorial and publishing roles. The leading force behind the launch of Supply Chain Management Review, he was that brand's founding publisher and editorial director from 1997 to 2000. Additionally, he has served as news editor, chief editor, publisher and editorial director of Logistics Management, as well as publisher of Modern Materials Handling. Mitch is also the president and CEO of Agile Business Media, LLC, the parent company of DC VELOCITY and CSCMP's Supply Chain Quarterly.
Just when you think you've heard of every possible route to the top, along comes someone like Danny Garst. Garst breached the upper ranks of supply chain management (he's vice president of supply chain management and information technology for Philips Consumer Electronics North America) not by working his way up from the warehouse floor or taking the MBA route, but by dazzling his superiors with his info tech (IT) acumen.
Garst had toiled away in the backwaters of customer service, operations and logistics at Philips Consumer Electronics (which makes such things as flat-screen TVs and DVD players) for some years when he was handed the challenge of his career: overseeing the replacement of literally a hundred legacy computer systems with SAP's multi-headed enterprise resource planning system. Though Garst claims to have lost a lot of hair during the run-up to the switch, he gained something more important: top management's respect.When the day arrived for Philips to turn off the legacy systems and take the ERP system live, things went off without a hitch. Garst was soon rewarded with a vice presidency—one with responsibility for not just one, but two, areas. Struck by the interdependency of IT and global supply chain operations, top management had decided to bundle the functions and make Garst responsible for both. Today, he oversees strategy development and implementation and has operational responsibility for supply chain and IT.
A member of both the Georgia Tech Executive Supply Chain Forum and the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals (CSCMP), Garst speaks regularly at local and national meetings. He sat down recently with DC VELOCITY Editorial Director Mitch Mac Donald to discuss his unique position at Philips, what led the company to outsource its delivery operations and why we shouldn't fear change.
Q: When I look at all the jobs you've had throughout your career, the question that comes to mind is: How does an IT guy end up in logistics? What's up with that?
A: Well,my background—a mix of IT and customer service —may be a little strange, but I don't think I'm the only logistics professional out there who has followed this path. The two things called logistics—or maybe more appropriately, supply chain—and IT have really come together in a big way. Over the last few years, Philips realized that at the global level, the IT function and the supply chain function were so closely intertwined that it made sense to put the two functions together.
Q: How is your job structured?
A: My current responsibilities include overseeing NAFTA-related issues, distribution and warehousing, and customer service as well as our event planning and forecasting processes in this region (North America). I'm also a member of the Consumer Electronics Global Supply Chain Board, whose members meet three or four times a year to make global policy decisions. We talk about what systems we're going to use and the priorities for our work. Bringing the board members together several times a year may be expensive, but it's necessary. If we didn't hash out these issues—if all of my counterparts were using their own systems and setting parameters that I wasn't aware of or didn't agree to—we'd have very little chance of succeeding. And, yes, I am also responsible for IT.
Q: What are some of the biggest challenges your operation has faced?
A: I'd say we met a huge challenge two or three years ago when we launched an initiative that would end up transforming our supply chain. It all started with our suspicion that perhaps our DCs weren't performing as well as they could, and in fact they weren't. But as we looked more deeply into it, we realized that the conversation wasn't just about DCs; it was really about transforming our supply chain. As you very well know, the distribution centers are really the execution arm of a very, very long supply chain. If you limit your focus to just part of the chain, like the DCs, you risk sub-optimizing the process as a whole.
That's particularly true today when the supply chain has become a global entity. Things were simpler back when most of our factories were located either here or in Mexico. Now, like so many industries, we find that our supply chain includes Europe, China and other Far Eastern countries. That has greatly complicated the picture and increased our risk of running afoul of the law of unintended consequences. For example, somebody could decide to purchase a certain part from a certain factory to save a penny, but that could generate a whole series of other problems and play havoc with our schedules.
Once we realized we would be tackling the entire supply chain, we got some outside help from IBM's consulting business. With IBM's help, we were able to model the entire supply chain, looking at questions like how much inventory we would need to carry if we wanted to hit this or that service target given the variations in lead times in factories around the world and the amount of demand variability for a single product.
Going forward, I think the biggest challenge will be obtaining a holistic view of our supply chain and managing it from end to end. Another challenge is educating our colleagues in the business to make them understand that the DC isn't necessarily responsible if something isn't delivered to a customer on time.
Q: You talked about some of the problems you encountered in the past. Have they been rectified?
A: Yes. For example, we were fairly sure that our DCs weren't operating efficiently, and that turned out to be the case. We were paying too much, and they weren't performing. After some discussion, we decided to outsource our entire regional logistics operations to Ryder. When we handed over the operations, however, we set very specific inventory accuracy targets.As a result, our inventory location accuracy shot up from the low 80s to over 99 percent. That's a huge turnaround, if you think about the impact on your DC operations, your fill rates and your ability to fulfill a customer's order. Without accurate inventory information, you have no way of knowing if you're out of an item. Or if you do have it, you may not be able to find it or at least find it quickly.
Today Ryder has full responsibility for our deliveries. We basically hand over the orders generated by our enterprise resource planning (ERP) system to them. We give them delivery windows, which are our customers' delivery windows, and we measure their performance on whether they hit the windows or not.
Q: Makes sense.
A: In fact, previously, we couldn't measure how well we were meeting the delivery windows. But now that we have integrated our systems with Ryder's, we're able to do that.
Q: How far back does your direct involvement in logistics date?
A: Well, I'd say my involvement in pure logistics, meaning distribution and transportation, dates back about 10 years.
Q: So you've been around long enough to see how technology can transform an operation. What technologies do you see making the biggest splash in the future?
A: RFID. As I see it, integrating RFID technologies from product manufacture to the retailer's shelf, and getting a return on investment will be our next big challenge.
Q: Is there anything that hasn't changed much in the past decade?
A: The need to meet the customer's requirements hasn't changed. What has changed are the requirements themselves. Customers have always had very definite expectations, but now those expectations are higher. For example, we used to talk about things in monthly buckets. Then we started talking about things in weekly buckets. Now retailers are stating their requirements in days.
Q: What's the biggest logistics challenge you've overcome in your career?
A: I think my answer would depend on which hat I had on at the moment. But I think the biggest challenge, honestly, was implementing an ERP system. We had maybe a hundred legacy systems that we replaced with SAP's ERP system in a "big bang" effort. Almost overnight, we turned off all those legacy systems and replaced them with SAP's financial, order management, material management, and SD (sales and distribution) modules. I lost a lot of hair during that two-year period. It wasn't so much the system; it was getting our people to understand and accept the changeover to the new process.
Q: Looking back, would you take that big bang approach—as opposed to a phased installation— again?
A: Probably not if I had a choice, but we didn't have a choice at the time.
Q: What skills or personal attributes do you draw upon most when you go to work each day?
A: Probably my refusal to be intimidated by change. I have no fear of change. I know that's a crazy thing to say because it's human nature to resist change. But look at what we've been able to accomplish in the last five years: we've implemented the SAP system, we've implemented an i2 [optimization system], we've completely outsourced our logistics operations. If we had been scared off by the prospect of change, we wouldn't have gotten the job done. I would also point to my willingness to lead change efforts. The likelihood of encountering some conflict along the way doesn't discourage me at all.
Q: What have you learned from managing all this change?
A: I think it would be to focus on processes, not systems. To me, if there is one thing we need to do in the supply chain community, it's to stop making our own stuff so darn complicated that you can't even explain it to someone on your own staff. We tend to rattle on about all this complicated stuff that makes CEOs look at us like we're crazy. Let's tone it down and keep it simple.
Container traffic is finally back to typical levels at the port of Montreal, two months after dockworkers returned to work following a strike, port officials said Thursday.
Today that arbitration continues as the two sides work to forge a new contract. And port leaders with the Maritime Employers Association (MEA) are reminding workers represented by the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) that the CIRB decision “rules out any pressure tactics affecting operations until the next collective agreement expires.”
The Port of Montreal alone said it had to manage a backlog of about 13,350 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) on the ground, as well as 28,000 feet of freight cars headed for export.
Port leaders this week said they had now completed that task. “Two months after operations fully resumed at the Port of Montreal, as directed by the Canada Industrial Relations Board, the Montreal Port Authority (MPA) is pleased to announce that all port activities are now completely back to normal. Both the impact of the labour dispute and the subsequent resumption of activities required concerted efforts on the part of all port partners to get things back to normal as quickly as possible, even over the holiday season,” the port said in a release.
The “2024 Year in Review” report lists the various transportation delays, freight volume restrictions, and infrastructure repair costs of a long string of events. Those disruptions include labor strikes at Canadian ports and postal sites, the U.S. East and Gulf coast port strike; hurricanes Helene, Francine, and Milton; the Francis Scott key Bridge collapse in Baltimore Harbor; the CrowdStrike cyber attack; and Red Sea missile attacks on passing cargo ships.
“While 2024 was characterized by frequent and overlapping disruptions that exposed many supply chain vulnerabilities, it was also a year of resilience,” the Project44 report said. “From labor strikes and natural disasters to geopolitical tensions, each event served as a critical learning opportunity, underscoring the necessity for robust contingency planning, effective labor relations, and durable infrastructure. As supply chains continue to evolve, the lessons learned this past year highlight the increased importance of proactive measures and collaborative efforts. These strategies are essential to fostering stability and adaptability in a world where unpredictability is becoming the norm.”
In addition to tallying the supply chain impact of those events, the report also made four broad predictions for trends in 2025 that may affect logistics operations. In Project44’s analysis, they include:
More technology and automation will be introduced into supply chains, particularly ports. This will help make operations more efficient but also increase the risk of cybersecurity attacks and service interruptions due to glitches and bugs. This could also add tensions among the labor pool and unions, who do not want jobs to be replaced with automation.
The new administration in the United States introduces a lot of uncertainty, with talks of major tariffs for numerous countries as well as talks of US freight getting preferential treatment through the Panama Canal. If these things do come to fruition, expect to see shifts in global trade patterns and sourcing.
Natural disasters will continue to become more frequent and more severe, as exhibited by the wildfires in Los Angeles and the winter storms throughout the southern states in the U.S. As a result, expect companies to invest more heavily in sustainability to mitigate climate change.
The peace treaty announced on Wednesday between Isael and Hamas in the Middle East could support increased freight volumes returning to the Suez Canal as political crisis in the area are resolved.
The French transportation visibility provider Shippeo today said it has raised $30 million in financial backing, saying the money will support its accelerated expansion across North America and APAC, while driving enhancements to its “Real-Time Transportation Visibility Platform” product.
The funding round was led by Woven Capital, Toyota’s growth fund, with participation from existing investors: Battery Ventures, Partech, NGP Capital, Bpifrance Digital Venture, LFX Venture Partners, Shift4Good and Yamaha Motor Ventures. With this round, Shippeo’s total funding exceeds $140 million.
Shippeo says it offers real-time shipment tracking across all transport modes, helping companies create sustainable, resilient supply chains. Its platform enables users to reduce logistics-related carbon emissions by making informed trade-offs between modes and carriers based on carbon footprint data.
"Global supply chains are facing unprecedented complexity, and real-time transport visibility is essential for building resilience” Prashant Bothra, Principal at Woven Capital, who is joining the Shippeo board, said in a release. “Shippeo’s platform empowers businesses to proactively address disruptions by transforming fragmented operations into streamlined, data-driven processes across all transport modes, offering precise tracking and predictive ETAs at scale—capabilities that would be resource-intensive to develop in-house. We are excited to support Shippeo’s journey to accelerate digitization while enhancing cost efficiency, planning accuracy, and customer experience across the supply chain.”
ReposiTrak, a global food traceability network operator, will partner with Upshop, a provider of store operations technology for food retailers, to create an end-to-end grocery traceability solution that reaches from the supply chain to the retail store, the firms said today.
The partnership creates a data connection between suppliers and the retail store. It works by integrating Salt Lake City-based ReposiTrak’s network of thousands of suppliers and their traceability shipment data with Austin, Texas-based Upshop’s network of more than 450 retailers and their retail stores.
That accomplishment is important because it will allow food sector trading partners to meet the U.S. FDA’s Food Safety Modernization Act Section 204d (FSMA 204) requirements that they must create and store complete traceability records for certain foods.
And according to ReposiTrak and Upshop, the traceability solution may also unlock potential business benefits. It could do that by creating margin and growth opportunities in stores by connecting supply chain data with store data, thus allowing users to optimize inventory, labor, and customer experience management automation.
"Traceability requires data from the supply chain and – importantly – confirmation at the retail store that the proper and accurate lot code data from each shipment has been captured when the product is received. The missing piece for us has been the supply chain data. ReposiTrak is the leader in capturing and managing supply chain data, starting at the suppliers. Together, we can deliver a single, comprehensive traceability solution," Mark Hawthorne, chief innovation and strategy officer at Upshop, said in a release.
"Once the data is flowing the benefits are compounding. Traceability data can be used to improve food safety, reduce invoice discrepancies, and identify ways to reduce waste and improve efficiencies throughout the store,” Hawthorne said.
Under FSMA 204, retailers are required by law to track Key Data Elements (KDEs) to the store-level for every shipment containing high-risk food items from the Food Traceability List (FTL). ReposiTrak and Upshop say that major industry retailers have made public commitments to traceability, announcing programs that require more traceability data for all food product on a faster timeline. The efforts of those retailers have activated the industry, motivating others to institute traceability programs now, ahead of the FDA’s enforcement deadline of January 20, 2026.
Online grocery technology provider Instacart is rolling out its “Caper Cart” AI-powered smart shopping trollies to a wide range of grocer networks across North America through partnerships with two point-of-sale (POS) providers, the San Francisco company said Monday.
Instacart announced the deals with DUMAC Business Systems, a POS solutions provider for independent grocery and convenience stores, and TRUNO Retail Technology Solutions, a provider that powers over 13,000 retail locations.
Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
According to Instacart, its Caper Carts transform the in-store shopping experience by letting customers automatically scan items as they shop, track spending for budget management, and access discounts directly on the cart. DUMAC and TRUNO will now provide a turnkey service, including Caper Cart referrals, implementation, maintenance, and ongoing technical support – creating a streamlined path for grocers to bring smart carts to their stores.
That rollout follows other recent expansions of Caper Cart rollouts, including a pilot now underway by Coles Supermarkets, a food and beverage retailer with more than 1,800 grocery and liquor stores throughout Australia.
Instacart’s core business is its e-commerce grocery platform, which is linked with more than 85,000 stores across North America on the Instacart Marketplace. To enable that service, the company employs approximately 600,000 Instacart shoppers who earn money by picking, packing, and delivering orders on their own flexible schedules.
The new partnerships now make it easier for grocers of all sizes to partner with Instacart, unlocking a modern shopping experience for their customers, according to a statement from Nick Nickitas, General Manager of Local Independent Grocery at Instacart.
In addition, the move also opens up opportunities to bring additional Instacart Connected Stores technologies to independent retailers – including FoodStorm and Carrot Tags – continuing to power innovation and growth opportunities for retailers across the grocery ecosystem, he said.