Abstract:
This is the project about the assessment and a redesign of the supply chain of Astore, the e-commerce business company located in Pakistan and dealing in the segment of eco-friendly, sustainable leather goods and fashion accessories. In as much as Astore has a well-established brand positioning and they adhere to ethical sourcing; they are still limited by some impeding issues in their supply chain activities. These are slow deliveries, costly shipping charges, poor visibility of inventories, inconsistent performance of the suppliers, poor management of returns, and limited applications of new technology. This project has the goal of developing a viable and proactive supply chain model that fits the brand of Astore and its aspirations to grow. Based on a careful diagnosis of the existing operating framework, supported by internal data, benchmarking against competitors in the market, interviews with stakeholders and the academic research literature, the project has singled out the root causes of the existing inefficiencies to propose some practical solutions that would covers five major areas: improvement of its logistics network, reverse logistics development, managing relationships with suppliers, and optimization of inventory and digital transformation. The strategic resourcing options are collaboration with third-party logistics (3PL) companies, implementation of micro-fulfillment stations in the areas where the demand is high, introduction of the AI-based tools of route optimization, ERP/WMS systems, and forecasting demand and inventory planning. By implementing KPI-based contracts and quarterly review cycles, supplier involvement will be enhanced, whereas the returns procedure will become digitized to be more transparent and convenient to the customers. In conclusion, the supply chain redesign will help in lowering the expenses involved in operations, increase delivery speed, customer satisfaction and strengthen the market leadership of Astore as a sustainable fashion retailer. The project provides a phased implementation plan over 12 months that would easily transform the supply chain to a technology based, agile and eco aligned e-commerce supply chain.
