Supply chain disruptions will abate but labor issues will linger.
Damaris Grütter, Managing Director of U.S. & Canada for Stoecklin Logistics, is sharing her vision of how the material handling world will change during the next 12 months. A long-time veteran of the industry, she draws on that experience to provide strategic insights to Stoecklin’s North American clients every day.
Damaris starts with a challenge facing most American companies and organizations – worker shortages. She believes automation will remove more risk rather than add to a business going forward. As workforce availability and reliability continues to be an issue, a business’s dependence on labor will be seen as a greater risk than the adoption of new automation technology. This will be especially true for technologies that have been around for a little while, like the use of robots for case picking, but the pure dollars and cents business case were borderline at best prior to the pandemic.
The push to re-shore production and supply chain will continue, Damaris continues. She sees companies experiencing the increased benefit of moving significant portions of their supply chain closer to the markets they serve in order to avoid the shortages the country has experienced during the last two years.
Finally, Damaris sees higher pricing for raw materials and transportation for most of 2022. Predictions from suppliers is that there is little indication of relief coming any time in the next six to nine months.
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