Make Supply Chain Engineering Your Secret Weapon in Today’s Freight Environment (Part 1 of 4)

Supply chain management is undergoing an existential transformation today. There are new challenges. Often rapid-fire, increasingly cataclysmic, they range from superstorms and triple-digit tariffs to geopolitical crises and unrelenting competition.

In the midst of it all, there are also new opportunities to run leaner, vastly better supply chains with greater speed and flexibility than ever before – all made possible through responsive, dynamic supply chain engineering.

A practice made for today’s opportunities and uncertainties

Supply chain engineering (SCE) is the pivot point that enables your company to reveal the new opportunities out there – and excel amidst challenges.

With SCE, you can uncover economies and efficiencies as well as tremendous utilization, service, resilience and sustainability benefits. SCE isn’t new. It’s existed for as long as supply chains. The difference is that now you can apply it much more easily and consistently.

It’s all on account of technology. Cloud computing, big data, analytics, artificial intelligence (AI), and machine learning (ML) are the tools that have unlocked faster, more powerful SCE today.

But like all tools, it’s how you use them that counts.

Disruption preparation is a key benefit

Compared to transportation today, supply chain management used to be predictable. Historical performance informed consistent plans and their execution. That is not so anymore. Shippers today need SCE to defend themselves from breaks in the supply chain. Gartner’s 2024 survey of CPOs indicated that their number one worry is supply chain disruptions.

SCE today features powerful tools for developing contingency plans for supply chain disruptions and enabling agile actions to avoid or minimize their impact. The ability to model and simulate supply chain changes is becoming more common. No shipper wants to be the only one in the market who can’t deliver when snow closes the I-80 or the Panama Canal runs dry.

Continuous optimization is the name of the game

In addition to the disruption angle there’s also an optimization angle. With today’s SCE software, the real-time infusion of data and other technological advances, the opportunities to optimize routes, modes, loads and more come in the moment. There is huge potential to realize cost savings, improve efficiency and more.

The risk of tremendous disruption and the potential for unprecedented optimization define the transportation environment every shipper is competing in today. The pressure’s on. Transportation costs greatly impact bottom line profitability and are constantly scrutinized. Technology leaders CTSI-Global estimate that transportation and logistics costs make up 9% – 14% of sales in companies.

An optimized supply chain imparts a significant competitive advantage, and advanced SCE is the key to unlock that advantage and juice up performance.

SCE reveals new opportunities to raise performance

Inefficient distribution and transportation networks can typically lower their distribution network costs up to 25% by upgrading systems, according to Bain & Company.

Committing to SCE has become a matter of competitive survival. A 2025 Gartner survey found that 95% of companies plan to increase investment in supply chain analytics – a fundamental aspect of SCE – over the next two years.

Supply chain engineering is now a necessity

We’re entering a stage where supply chains that happen organically or operate without constant analysis and scrutiny will be the exception.

The bottom line is that shippers need to do it – or they need to partner with experts who can do it for them. What exactly is the “it” we’re talking about? A helpful definition of supply chain engineering is in order.

Read our next post in this series to explore the key aspects of supply chain engineering and the advantages of advanced SCE practices.

To take a deep dive into the topic of SCE, download the white paper, Supply Chain Engineering: Efficiencies and Optimizations for Fleet Operators.

To learn more about TA Dedicated’s supply chain engineering strategies and how we can help you meet your goals, contact us at 651-686-2500.