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Transportation Mode Tradeoffs: How Truck, LTL, Rail, Ocean, and Air Shape Your Supply Chain
Transportation isn’t just a line item—it’s a strategy lever. The mode you choose affects cost, lead time, capacity, reach, visibility, reliability, and environmental impact, and those tradeoffs ripple into inventory levels, customer promise dates, cash flow, and risk exposure. Highmark Solutions’ lays out these differences side-by-side, which is exactly how supply chain leaders should evaluate mode decisions: not as “cheapest” or “fastest,” but as the best fit for this shipme
Jake Ackerman
Feb 45 min read


Making the Work Worth Doing: How Smarter Sourcing Helps Midwest Shops Stay Focused and Profitable
This blog explores how smart sourcing strategies, including affordable offshore tooling and vetted overseas production, help U.S. machine shops protect their best work, offload the rest, and remain competitive.
Jake Ackerman
Jun 19, 20252 min read


Navigating the Alphabet Soup of Manufacturing Efficiency
These acronyms, while compact, carry a wealth of information and best practices essential for optimizing operations, ensuring quality, and f
Jake Ackerman
Sep 18, 20243 min read
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