Agile, focused and harmonized, DLA moves forward

Logistics Spectrum, Jan-Mar 2001 by Stephenson, Andy

"Right Item, Right Place, Right Price....Every Time. " This statement clearly describes the scope of DLA's mission, which is to provide support to our Warfighters around the globe, in peace and war, and assist in relief efforts during national emergencies. More specifically, DLA provides supply and distribution support, and technical and logistics services to all branches of the military. By responding to its customers' needs and adopting improved, streamlined logistics business practices, DLA has evolved as the provider of choice. With approximately 4 million managed items and customers in most countries of the world, DLA must continue to satisfy a variety of logistics requirements.

As the current operating environment in the Department of Defense changes, DLA must continuously seek and implement new technologies and business processes. DLA has reorganized to meet the changes in the 21 st century. This reorganization, referred to as DLA 21, streamlined and realigned the organization to be more agile, focused and harmonized to remain relevant and perform supply chain management functions. DLA has used innovative approaches in the acquisition of logistics services to reengineer various logistics business processes. Some reengineering efforts take the form of Reinvention Labs, while others are simply implemented as modifications to the existing business processes. "Better, Faster and Cheaper" service to the customer are the direct results of these efforts. Nine initiatives that exemplify DLA's incorporation of commercial practices and technology are described in the remainder of this article.

Guaranteed Traffic (GT)/Optimum Benefit Negotiation (OBN) Program

DLA partnered with the Military Traffic Management Command (MTMC) on the Guaranteed Traffic (GT)/Optimum Benefit Negotiation (OBN) Program, which is a competitive, bid-based traffic award program. Commercial carriers are evaluated equally on price (the rate submitted by a carrier) and on technical elements (carrier services provided, carrier past performance and carrier managerial capabilities). The GT/OBN traffic awards are based on a specific period of time, from a DLA depot to a grouping of states, points or by round trip movements. The GT/OBN review allows active participation by the DLA transportation officer and gathers information from a variety of sources. Two evaluation teams are used; one from the DLA facility/depot and a second from the Joint Traffic Management Office at MTMC.

Dedicated Truck

The implementation and optimization of scheduled dedicated truck service is an excellent example of a win-win partnership with our customers. Traditionally, installations received packages through an uncoordinated mix of delivery modes. This mix wasted resources and time, and made the process more unpredictable. Because the truck is dedicated to a customer or route, services can be tailored to meet the customer's requirements to a degree not possible with ad hoc transportation arrangements. Examples of tailored services are compressed transit times, scheduled deliveries, split deliveries and flexible schedules.

Premium Service

Premium Service uses the latest in commercial practices to significantly reduce order-ship time, thus allowing a reduction of both wholesale and retail stocks. Customers store critical, mission-essential items in a centralized contractor-owned, contractor-operated facility in Memphis, Tennessee. The contractor provides guaranteed direct door-to-door delivery within 24 hours in the Continental United States (CONUS) and delivery to foreign countries within 48 hours. Premium Service is available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

The program partners DLA with a third party provider. This allows DLA to provide guaranteed expedited delivery of critical, high dollar-value assets to its customers with less paperwork and at a lower cost. The expedited requisition processing, which requires special handling in traditional depots, is routine practice with Premium Service. It allows CONUS customers to receive their orders within 24 hours after receipt of the requisition at the Premium Service warehouse. Requisitions for overseas customers are delivered to the servicing in-country airport within 48 hours with same day or next day customs clearance and delivery. Being collocated with FedEx's Memphis Hub, requisitions can be received up to midnight central time with guaranteed next day delivery within the Continental United States. These late evening requisitions are often delivered to the customer in less than 12 hours after receipt of the requisition. For west coast customers, this increased window of opportunity to place orders for parts or equipment is like giving them an extra day's worth of access to inventory.

Currently, the 80,000 square-foot Premium Service facility houses over 1200 lines from the Army, Navy, Coast Guard and DLA. Premium Service fills an important niche in the total DLA support system. Opportunities to expand the number of items and customers are available.