Cartoning Services Category Procurement Intelligence Report

Business practices within Cartoning Services market are heavily influenced by changing trends across the category as well as within the broader Warehousing and Storage market. Rise in minimum labor wages across countries such as the US and China will result in increased employee expenses for Cartoning Services suppliers who will be forced to pass on a part of this increase to their buyers.

Cyber security has emerged as a top priority within logistics and supply chain ecosystems. New accountability standards are emerging for the way suppliers and buyers collaborate and protect sensitive information and assets.

Sustainability has emerged as a pivotal theme for procurement decisions related to supply chain. Companies are expecting their suppliers to internalize globally accepted sustainability practices and demonstrate a solid history of putting in practice similar principles. It is worth noting that practices of sustainability are not limited to only environmental impact but has taken a greater meaning of practices that can reduce the overall cost of operations in the long term.

As a result, category managers need to closely monitor the Cartoning Services procurement trends and identify changes required in their procurement environment for the category.

It has become imperative for category managers to remain as agile as possible in terms of their procurement practices. However, it is not always easy to quickly spot and implement alternative practices in a category like Cartoning Services. To help quick decision making, this report advises on several procurement best practices that have worked well for category managers.

For example, Buyers should assess service providers' capability of predicting the weather, traffic, and other real-time information, which might affect shipments that are in transit or in its delivery times.

Buyers must track suppliers' quality management systems to ensure that the products are stored in a hygienic environment and have almost zero probability of occurrence of damages. This is particularly critical for buyers in industries such as food and beverages and pharmaceutical.

It is important for category managers to track and measure supplier performance against a defined set of KPIs that are agreed upon by both parties during contract negotiation, including inventory accuracy, dock-to-stock, and on-time shipment. This is critical to ensure the optimal level of service. Suppliers' performance can also be linked to a part of their fee, which can be paid depending on the level of services rendered.

Cartoning Services procurement managers also need to proactively identify and mitigate potential risks that can arise in the supply chain or contracts for Cartoning Services procurement. Some examples include: