Compressing the supply chain through E-commerce for the customer Dissertation

Compressing the supply chain through E-commerce for the customer benefit in the fashion industry - Dissertation Example h higher volumes of consumers across the world due to high adoption levels of Internet consumption has reduced dependency on decentralized procurement and distribution systems, allowing them to centralize these functions for efficiency, time, and also cost savings. In Sweden, as one example, 90 percent of consumers use the Internet (Entertainment NewsWeekly 2011). In Singapore, younger consumers are buying fashion products via the Internet at a growth rate of approximately 10 percent annually (Ramchandani 2011). In the United States, e-commerce sales are estimated, currently, at $227.6 billion (Steigrad 2011). It is these growth patterns in online fashion consumption that continue to provide new opportunities to compress traditional supply chains to include more efficiency and replenishment for fashion products that have very limited life cycles. Reducing the dependency on traditional collaborations, the newer, unrestricted geographic boundaries imposed by less efficient procurement and distribution systems and even changing consumer trends for purchasing and demand continue to drive new synergies for using e-commerce as a fashion supply model. Research aims and objectives This research project aims to identify how to achieve maximized customer benefit by using e-commerce as a tool to compress the supply chain. Cost-reduction, improved efficiency, streamlined supply chain processes and fashion replenishment will be examined to determine how to gain outputs that lead to customer benefits. The research objectives are as follows: 1. Determine the nature of consumer fashion market demand driving new e-commerce procurement and distribution models. 2. Identify the current e-commerce supply chain models currently finding success in key fashion markets. 3. Determine how... This research project will tackle the issues of e-commerce within the supply chain under the premise that there is no pre-existing template that provides greater benefit to the customer. Thus, the project will be wholly exploratory in design. The traditional agile supply chain methodology involves demand-driven systems. In such a chain, market data and information are exchanged from the business to all layers of the supply chain process in order to forecast and deliver replenishment to meet consumer demand. However, agile supply networks seem to only have this title for their ability to provide merchandise by moving sourcing closer to specific target consumer markets (Barnes and Lea-Greenwood). Even under agile systems, merchandise planning failures have caused price increases on consumer goods, high levels of excess inventories, and significantly lower margins that come from demand uncertainty and collaborative failures within this vast network of procurement and distribution. Why is this? In the sourcing process, considerable investment is included in testing procedures once the textile raw materials have been purchased. All quality assurance processes are different depending on the fashion merchandiser, however it usually includes quality checks of threads, buttons, zipper durability, and testing fabric swatches/samples against existing quality standards templates. The Hong Kong Clothing Company, as one example, boasts an agile supply chain network that includes rigorous quality checks prior to even distributing the raw materials/textiles to the production floor in-house.

Close reading Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Close reading - Essay Example Matusky and Sooi (2004) studied the Malaysian dance and commented that the Malaysian musical traditions were always accompanied with dance or dance drama that did not have any dialogue as its essence was to engage the audience to the set act so that they could derive a meaning out of the performance. This acted as an act that included the attributes of the classical or folk music2. As a result, the dance incorporated the use of the body more so the hands and the feet. Thus through their traditional Malay music, the Malay dancer(s) introduced the use of hands as they swayed their hands from side to side or up and down as a form to express emotion and attachment to the song. Malay classical dance history and characteristics The early Malay dances incorporated various dance forms such as mak yong, mek mulung and manohra and these were practiced often in the courts thus their origination. The mak yong comprised of a much dramatized dance act that depicted the stories of the princes and p rincesses. The women who acted as princesses wore royal costumes while the men wore the same costumes and an additional male clown. Their dance was also accompanied by drums, gongs and a serunai. The dance is also related to Puteri, which is an ancient ritual that was believed, that when it was performed by the dancers, it was prone to release supernatural powers and as a result, the kings did not follow much on that, rather they adopted the dance that was related to theatrical performances. This dance involved the simple act of a female and a male at the courts. Manohra also shares some aspects with mak yong such as the dance that consists of the female and the male and it also incorporates more of dance rather than the story that is behind to the dance set being performed. Manohra also served as a traditional and respected ritual and it was also believed to have the aspect of super natural powers. When the dance was performed, it was always accompanied with the serunai, two gedung , two gedumbak, kesi, bamboo or wood clappers and gongs. As of today, there exists only two active manohra groups’ in Malaysia and tey happen to occupy the parts of Kelantan. Mek mulung on the other hand involved a dance drama that depicted a local legend that had happened in the community. As a result this dance also had the same aspects in meaning and body gesture when compared to mak yong and manohra. When the dance was performed, it was always accompanied with the use of the serembong, gong, serunai and ceruk. The oldest surviving Malaysian performance traditions can be dated back to the peoples of the Orang Asli communities of Peninsular Malaysia who are very scarce in numbers in the region. Some of the community sub groups include the Negrito communities that include the Bateq, Jahai, Kensui, Kintak, Lanoh and Mendriq peoples and they are located in the Kelantan, Pahang, Perak and Terengganu regions. The Senoi include the Che Wong, Jahut, Mahmeri, Semai, Semoq Beri and Temiar peoples who are located in Kelantan, Pahang, Perak and Selangor, and the Proto-Malay peoples incorporate the Jakun, Orang Kanaq, Orang Laut, Orang Seletar, Semelai and Temuan) majoritively in Johor, Melaka, Negeri Sembilan and Pahang. The Orang Asli performances involved the incorporation of music, song and dance and they were preformed mainly at social events