The 11th International Meeting on Research in Logistics and Supply Chain Management (RIRL) held at the EPFL in Lausanne amply confirmed the importance of this subject and the quality of research being carried out in universities and leading international business schools.
Of the approximately 120 papers submitted, 80 were presented at the congress. After review by several international experts, the best of them were selected for publication in Logistique & Management as well as in Supply Chain Forum: An International Journal which chose six papers to form a special edition.
The choice of these papers from a very wide range of interesting submissions illustrates the cross-disciplinary nature and the global impact of supply chain management in general and logistics in particular.
Three papers, based on a comprehensive review of the literature, address themes that are both strategic and operational, practical and theoretical.
Two other articles compare organisations in the field of logistical services while the sixth offers an original operational research initiative applied to the food manufacturing industry.
Simone Voldrich, Nicolas Zufferey and Philippe Wieser present a new approach to optimising a value chain, linked to the food industry case. It balances performance and cost dimensions against the risks associated with the presence or absence of quality controls.
In his article, Rudolf Large looks at who buys logistical services. The literature focuses on why and how to choose the suppliers of these services but there is very little research into how the various departments of a company are involved in these decisions. Based on a German study, this paper reveals the importance of people inside the company in buying logistical services.
In a comprehensive review of the literature, Tino Herden shows how the development of ‘Supply Chain Analytics’ can be helpful in managing the global supply chain and the decision-making processes it involves. Nine of these processes have been identified and examined, demonstrating the benefits that ‘Data Science’ promises for supply chain management.
Aurélien Rouquet and Gilles Paché examine two different experimental systems for the distribution of fruit and vegetables. The hunter-gatherer model, in which the consumer goes onto a farm and picks what he wants, is compared to the self-service model of the major retailers. In an interesting study, the authors characterise the first model as hedonist and the second as utilitarian.
Yan Cimon and Diane Poulin offer a systematic revue of the literature on the Nespresso case. Although the company is internationally recognised as highly innovative, it has not been widely studied. This article shows how the Nespresso model has been incorporated and how it creates value at each stage of evolution, including in the field of logistics, and how this strategic leverage can be applied in other areas.
Elsa Corbin, Eric Lambourdière and Claudia Rebolledo explore the different ways that suppliers of logistical services create an advantage in this highly competitive and uncertain field. In the Americas, the authors have focused on the theory of resources and on dynamic capacities, showing their beneficial impact on the performance of the suppliers.
In bringing you these six high-quality articles, our thanks go to the authors, the scientific committee of the 11th RIRL meetings and all those who reviewed the material. We hope you enjoy your reading and look forward to seeing you at the 12th International Meetings on Research in Logistics and Supply Chain Management.