Proactive Product, Supply and Demand Strategies for Constructing Robust Supply Chains

When major disruptions strike, many supply chains tend to break and take a long time to recover. However, not only can some supply chains continue to function smoothly; they continue to satisfy their customers during and after a major disruption strikes. Some key differentiators of these “robust” supply chains are some specific cost-effective and timeefficient proactive strategies. In this paper, we present various proactive strategies and the associated contingency plans that will enable a supply chain to become more resilient in the face of unpredictable disruptions. We also propose an approach for selecting the most effective proactive strategy. While there are costs for implementing these proactive strategies, they provide additional selling points for acquiring and retaining apprehensive customers.