As we enter
2017 and
Burris Logistics
begins its
92nd year;
I wish to
recognize the
many people
and organizations we have
been blessed
to serve for so
many years.
Our company and family are grateful. Additionally,
I want to acknowledge the contributions of our
Burris team members who have always put service
excellence as a top priority. Our people are truly
committed to continuous improvement and innovation and are constantly listening to our partners
and monitoring the industry as a whole.
So what will 2017 bring? What are
we hearing and seeing, and how do
we plan to move forward? The trends
and disruptive forces witnessed over the
last several years, mostly driven by the
highly informed digital consumer; not
only continue, but seem to be accelerating. More
food choices can be found in more places either
fully prepared, partially prepared, in meal kits, and
other forms. These can be found in more places
including wholesale clubs, traditional supermarkets,
restaurants, in restaurants within stores, emerging
alternate channels, and delivered to the home.
Food varieties are also increasing rapidly. Increasing fresh, healthy, organic, and ethnic choices are
major factors.
The speed, flexibility, and agility demands in
supply chain response and
execution is becoming equally
as challenging. The increasing variety of foods
coming from more origins and going to more
destinations with shorter shelf-lives complicates
traditional planning models. Optimizing the
perishable supply chain and finding balance
between on-shelf or on-hand availability and
acceptable shrink or waste levels is one of the
industries greatest challenges. Gaining access
to actionable data and increasing agility is
essential.
So how does Burris Logistics help? We first focus on what we do best, but enhance our capabilities to do it all better and faster than ever before.
However, working harder isn’t good enough, we
must also innovate with our partners to do things
smarter. We have a long history of operating as
stewards of the cold chain and food safety has
always been a priority. Today, with our partners
we face the Food Safety Moderation Act together.
We have been proactive to move beyond a state of
compliance, but to a higher level goal in commitment, processes, and tools. This includes enhancing
our capabilities of time and temperature monitoring
and providing real-time end-to-end visibility for our
customers, attaining SQF standards, and more.
We continue to invest in fleet, material handling
equipment, and facility technologies and improve-
ments. Digital fleets and facilities and becoming
interconnected. We are currently working
with service partners to enhance capabil-
ities in providing solutions such as small
package deliveries or final mile to homes
to extend our service reach. We are also
developing new technology based solutions
around our customers’ needs in collabora-
tion with them. These customized solutions
will provide our customers with greater end-to-end
visibility in real time, by harnessing data from
multiple places, and making it all
more relative and insightful. At
the same time, we work diligently
to secure and protect this data as
we utilize it to automate processes
and decisions through analytics.
2017 OUTLOOK
“We have a long history of operating as stewards of the cold
chain and
food safety
has always
been a
priority.”
BURRISLOGISTICS.COM
Donnan (Donnie) R. Burris
Chief Executive Officer
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