Discuss The Advantages And Disadvantages Of Logistics

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The typical elements of a logistic system, such as customer services, sales forecasting, distribution communications, stock control, materials handling and ordering, amongst others, may give companies competitive advantages, especially when based on the exchange of reliable information between the links in the chain (Bowersox, Closs & Drayer, 2005). A complementary factor here is that the advantage provided by logistics becomes stronger to the extent that it also incorporates such activities as management of customers with a high level of demand, expertise in financial decision-making and the use of different methods of purchasing products and services (Bowersox, Closs & Drayer, 2000).
If we accept Ballou’s (2006) viewpoint that the physical …show more content…

The advantages based on value have increasingly concentrated on services where customers seek reliability and responsiveness (Christopher, 2007).
Although Christopher (2007) not only highlights the possibility of combining competitive advantages derived from cost and value but also the possible contribution of logistics, other authors point out the importance of strategic alignment in the most uniform chain as a means of obtaining differentiation. In Porter’s (2007) opinion, a competitive strategy consists in deliberately choosing a set of integrated activities in order to provide a unique combination of value.
Porter’s (1996) thinking on this issue is also echoed by Chopra & Meindl (2003), for whom strategic alignment presupposes strategies involving the supply chain. The displacement of competition from between companies to between chains forces each one to put forward its strategies. These are generally based on responsiveness and efficiency as the defining factors in strategic positioning or on the balance between them in all the logistic activities in the chain, since it is assumed that there is alignment between its links (Chopra & Meindl, 2003; Fischer,

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