Roll on highway, roll on along
Roll on daddy till you get back home
Roll on family, roll on crew
Roll on momma like I asked you to do
And roll on eighteen-wheeler, roll on (roll on)
Alabama

We’re still being promised drone delivery, but the reality is most goods still move over land by truck (even if rail is more environmentally friendly and uses less fuel and could be built to use renewable energy, especially for short haul or common lanes, if we went back to a powered track … ) … and those trucks Roll On!

Ten years ago we noted that, despite the fact you need those trucks to Roll On, your logistics could come to a screeching halt. You could wake up and there could be no one to drive the truck (due to a continuing driver shortage or a unionized strike), no fuel to gas it up (due to shortages caused by a natural disaster, etc.), or, worse yet, no truck at all (because your delivery company can’t afford the new insurance premiums, which is a harsh reality — a few years ago minimum insurance requirements were jacked up across the board and small mom-and-pop shops had to shut down, and it could happen again).

And the situation has’t changed. The sky isn’t falling, but without proper planning, that includes contingency plans, with the continual driver shortage, constantly rising fuel prices (and seemingly regular shortages due to poor planning and resiliency on the part of the providers and an increasing array of governmental regulations in developed countries), and increasing thefts of expensive automobile — and truck — parts (with restricted supply) to take advantage of high (scrap) metal prices, any company could find itself in a situation where the sky might as well be falling.

And the eight pieces of advice given by Lora Cecere (the supply chain shaman), then of AMR and now of Supply Chain Insights, are just as relevant now as then.

• Plan for tighter capacity
• Make Fuel Management Part of Risk Management
• Get the Right Supply Chain Planning (SCP) Master Data
• Rethink Customer-PickUp (CPU) Programs
• Diversify Entry Ports
• Face Reality — (Re)Design Your Network for Efficiency
• Get Help from a Good Partner
• Make U.S. Transportation Infrastructure an Item on the National Agenda^*

As are the three pieces of advice the doctor gave you ten years ago:

• Use Decision Optimization
• Don’t Forget Security
• Invest in Visibility

And the only thing we’d add is that when you have to spot-buy, spot-buy smartly. Use new services like Freightos. Don’t know who they are? Better find out … NOW! (SI Freightos intro … and they are Flippin’ Freight Quotes Faster than a Fleet-Footed Feline on Guarana … Still!)

^*Best of luck getting anything accomplished with your current administration — hard to buy American to build American when there are no more American-made options!