As we head into the holiday season, retail has plenty to contend with: rising costs, increased employee turnover, somehow managing inventory and more. In this episode, Gartner Vice President of Research, Retail Mike Griswold joins Scott and Greg to review key strategies for successful S&OP planning, break down the big merger between Kroger and Albertsons, dive into advice for the holiday season and more.

Intro/Outro (00:03):

Welcome to Supply Chain. Now, the voice of global supply chain supply chain now focuses on the best in the business for our worldwide audience, the people, the technologies, the best practices, and today’s critical issues, the challenges and opportunities. Stay tuned to hear from those Making Global Business happen right here on supply chain Now.

Scott Luton (00:32):

Hey, hey. Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, Scott Luton and Greg White with you here on Supply Chain. Now, welcome to today’s live stream, Greg. How we doing

Greg White (00:41):

Exceptionally well,

Scott Luton (00:42):

Man. So,

Greg White (00:43):

Just a surprising day, surprising, and I don’t know, encouraging. You saw my commentary today, one of my least favorite retailers, I think one that me and some other professionals believe probably shouldn’t even be in business today, right?

Scott Luton (00:57):

Is

Greg White (00:58):

Changing supply chain and merchandising together in a way that should have been done decades ago, is hyper encouraging and frankly, something that every retailer, I mean, they’re not just changing their business, they are changing the business, in my opinion, just the way that they’re approaching it. So, super, super encouraging. Macy’s

Scott Luton (01:19):

Outstanding. I’ll tell you, I love it. I love your commentaries. Monday, Wednesday and Friday every morning on LinkedIn. Y’all check that out. It is not to be missed. Uh, and today, speaking of things I love, we’ve got one of our longest running series, most populous series, it’s supply chain today and tomorrow with Mike Griswold with Gartner, Greg, today’s gonna be a bit of a unique hour with Mike as we’re gonna be walking through some of the leading headlines from, of course, inflation to Amazon and employee turnover there, Uh, Kroger’s and Albertson’s, their merger news, and of course, some bold predictions for the holiday shopping season from a supply chain standpoint. And Greg, since we get asked all the time about, you know, how to get ahead in your career, we’re gonna go ahead and pose that both of y’all in today’s show. So it is a jam packed episode.

Greg White (02:06):

Oh, boy, <laugh>. Yeah, it’s, I mean, it’s, and always great when Mike stops through. He is, he’s the consummate professional. I think, uh, the last show, the one I missed where you guys actually got to talk, uh, he talked about what his role is and how people interact with him, which I think is incredibly valuable. Pro a long time coming, right? Probably, probably should have shared that a little earlier, but I’m glad he got the chance to do it anyway.

Scott Luton (02:32):

Completely agree. I think a lot of folks are mystified with what industry analysts do, especially Hall of Fame analysts like, uh, Mike, who’s also been a practitioner, uh, which is important. So y’all check that out. That was the last, last month’s episode, and the replay’s always available. Now we’re gonna share a couple quick events, say hello to a few folks, and then we’ll be swooshing in Mike Griswold. But I got a quick trivia question for you. Do you know Greg, what took place one year ago? Let’s see here, One year ago today, And this might be a clue.

Greg White (03:03):

<laugh>. Wait, what? Oh, oh, let me guess. Uh, lemme think about that. The Braves won the World Series.

Scott Luton (03:09):

Yes. Yes. And despite their collapse this year against affiliates, which are given the Astros all they want, then some, right?

Greg White (03:16):

I mean, the Astros can’t even cheat their way to the World

Scott Luton (03:19):

Series. Oh, gosh. We’re gonna get some hate mail today about, we

Greg White (03:23):

Give up four dingers yesterday. Not that I wanna rub it in, but I think it was like three dingers and one inning. Is that right? Something?

Scott Luton (03:30):

Yeah, I think you’re right. <laugh>. We’re gonna hear a lot from Macy’s folks and from the Houston Astros folks, but that’s okay. Uh, all in good fun. Okay. So yeah, we celebrate, uh, one year ago today, the World Series was won by the Atlanta Braves is still the only team to win a World Series Championship in three cities, Atlanta,

Greg White (03:50):

And still World Series Champion.

Scott Luton (03:52):

That is right. Thank you. You’re making my day now. Now I’m on Greg’s level. All right. So kidding aside, I wanna share a couple of quick learning opportunities and really volunteer service opportunities. And I want to start with our ongoing leveraging logistics for Ukraine, uh, initiative, right? Led by our, uh, friends over at Vector Global Logistics. I’ll tell you what, they give so much for the good things and, and do good initiatives out across the world. Lately, though, the recent wrinkle or twists in this initiative is they’re, they’re soliciting letters written by kids letters of support, like one’s pictured here that they wanna bundle and send over to school kids in Ukraine. Now, Greg folks may like roll their eyes at that, but you know, Greg, back in the day when you get something in the mail, I mean, that made your day, maybe made your week, and that’s kind of what we’re trying to do here, right? Some meaningful support. Your quick, uh, thoughts here, Greg,

Greg White (04:43):

I did. It made you feel significant, right? That somebody would actually address something to you. Now, everything is addressed to you all the time, but rarely in actual physical form. And I think that’s really, really powerful. It, it is probably Scott more powerful than it even was when we were kids, right?

Scott Luton (05:01):

Yes. That’s great point.

Greg White (05:03):

I mean, there’s so many other ways to communicate these days.

Scott Luton (05:06):

Yep, great point. So it’s all about, you may hear Mike and the Gartner team talk about business outcomes. Little twist on that. This is focused on humanitarian outcomes, and so far over 500,000 pounds of relief supplies have made it across the pond to Ukraine and Poland and folks in need. Now, all of that is governed and driven by our planning sessions. And the next one is November 15th at 11:00 AM Eastern Time. There’s no obligation. You can come put your mic on mute and just listen and learn kind of what’s going on, especially from a practitioner’s standpoint, what the need is, what’s being done. There’s no obligation. Of course, if you can give, like Greg says, give big, give small, but just give, It’d be great if you can support our efforts. But, uh, check out the link. They dropped the comments, and we’d love to have you be a part of our efforts. Okay? And then really quick, our next webinar, Greg, November 9th, we’re gonna be talking with our friends at Omni Partners about how GPOs not GTOs. I bet Carl can, can help us maybe not mitigate

Greg White (06:05):

GTOs not gonna help you mitigate risk <laugh>. That’s right. But GPO is,

Scott Luton (06:09):

Yeah, beat me to it, as always. Yes. But check out November 9th session at 12 noon with our dear friends at Omnia Partners, how GPOs can help mitigate your risks. Okay? And that link is in the comments as well. Before we bring on Mike, Greg, let’s say hello to a few folks. We’ve got, uh, a good friend back with us, old PB Peter Bole all night and all day he says, Sweet. Finally catching a chat with Mike again. Hope you had a great golf season, Mike. We’ll find out. Get Mike’s up. Update on golf, huh?

Greg White (06:37):

Yeah, let’s check out his handicap. I’d like to see some actual verification of that as well. Peter

Scott Luton (06:43):

<laugh>. That’s right. Mario is with us. Great to see you guys. I like the positive vibes here. Greetings from Dallas. Did I say Mike? I met Mario. I’m part of thinking, Mike, you

Greg White (06:53):

Said Mario.

Scott Luton (06:54):

Oh, did I? Okay. Yeah. Mario, great to have you here. We lean into positive vis and, and positive thinking. And, uh, hey, how about them cowboys, Greg. How, how are the Cowboys doing?

Greg White (07:04):

I don’t know. That’s a i I mean, they had the potential for a real quarterback, right? Controversy with Cooper.

Scott Luton (07:12):

I’ll go with that. Yeah.

Greg White (07:14):

Although I’m a huge Dak Prescott fan. I loved watching him play in college. I think if they can get an offensive line in front of him, right? Um,

Scott Luton (07:24):

I think he’s gonna be back. I think he’s getting healthy, uh, maybe this week or next week. Uh,

Greg White (07:29):

Well, he was available last week. I think they played a Sunday night or a Monday night game. That’s embarrassing. I’m sorry. I’ve been woefully deficient in watching football this

Scott Luton (07:39):

Season. So Mario, let us know, and great to have you here. Appreciate the, uh, the great feedback there. Of course, Catherine, Amanda, behind the scenes helping to make production happen today. Big thanks. All that y’all do there, Reggie, you’re welcome. For the invite, we try to have the movers and shakers with us on all of these live streams. And glad that you’re here. Let us know where you’re tuned in from. Uh, helmet. Great to see you, Scott and Greg, you’re our supply chain champions, <laugh>, little sports analogy, like that helmet.

Greg White (08:04):

Yeah.

Scott Luton (08:04):

Greg, Uh, any thoughts? <laugh>, how would you res, how would you respond?

Greg White (08:08):

Well, thank you. I appreciate it. I mean, I think we’re, uh, maybe coaches, right? Of hopefully champions and future champions.

Scott Luton (08:15):

There we go. I like that. And great, always great to have you with us, Helen. I appreciate what you do. I think especially in the procurement space, your procurement thought leadership. Okay. So with no further ado, Greg White. We’ve got one of our favorite guests who’s been with us, probably, I think we’re going on year three of this series, if I’m not mistaken. It’s evolved,

Greg White (08:33):

Put up with us for so long.

Scott Luton (08:34):

Me neither, <laugh>. But I’ll tell you what has not changed is the feedback we get when Mike joined us and what he shares here. So y’all are in for a treat. So, with that said, I wanna welcome him in the one only Mike Griswold, Vice President Analyst with Gartner. Mike, how are you doing?

Mike Griswold (08:52):

Hey, great. I’ll give you real quick. Dallas Cowboy’s update. Cooper Rush was the Rush

Greg White (08:57):

Cooper Cups to,

Mike Griswold (08:59):

Sorry. Dak has, Yeah, Cooper Cup is the guy from the Rams. Uh, Dak has been back for two weeks. They beat the Lions and they beat the Bears. Now they’re on a bi week, so they’re doing all right. I mean, we had, myself included, when, when Dak got hurt against Tampa Bay, the season looked like it was over. Yeah. Cooper Rush came in, played really well there, there was never gonna be a quarterback controversy despite what people like to stir up. And the buy comes at a good time, but they still need to beat some good teams. And they haven’t done that yet. They, they lost to the Eagles. And now the opening season loss to Tampa Bay, if I, if I put my college basketball hat on, that’s a bad loss. It’s

Greg White (09:36):

Not a quality loss.

Mike Griswold (09:37):

You’re right. No, it is not a quality loss the way Tampa Bay is playing. So, we’ll see. The defense is playing well, I think the offense is, is

Greg White (09:43):

Starting. You’re a Cowboys fan.

Mike Griswold (09:45):

Oh, yeah, yeah. Long time fan. Long time.

Scott Luton (09:50):

I didn’t

Mike Griswold (09:51):

Know that. It’s great to see everyone, great to be here. This is one of the highlights of my month for sure, is, is spending time with, with all of you and, and the people that are kind enough to, to carve an hour out of what I’m sure is a very busy day, to spend an hour with us. So I, I really appreciate

Scott Luton (10:05):

All that, man. Learn something new every day. We’re gonna have you on our supply chain nerves talk sports, uh, show soon, Mike.

Mike Griswold (10:12):

No, that would be great.

Greg White (10:13):

About basketball, of course. But now, yeah, I mean, we, Yes,

Scott Luton (10:17):

Coming up soon, we’re overdue. Uh, we’re gonna have our friend Albert from the Atlanta Gladiators, uh, in a, um, a hockey franchise. Oh, okay. Who are overdue for that. They just kicked off their new season and they put on it, put on a quality show. So we’ll have that, uh, get ready for that coming up soon. Uh, okay. So Greg and Mike, as we get down the business, we’ve got some great news headlines to walk through. I can’t wait to get y’all’s take on some of those things as well as some advice for, uh, folks fighting to climb up that career ladder. But I wanna start with kind of a fun warmup question, kind of fun and kind of serious at the same time, you know, between all the pressures of the post pandemic, world inflation, supply chain pressures, you name it, it’s all about stress all too often, then the holidays on top of it. But today is national stress awareness day, right? So Mike and Greg, Mike, I’m gonna start with you. What is one thing that you do to de-stress and kind of recharge the batteries a bit?

Mike Griswold (11:11):

Uh, it’s usually something around exercise. You know, whether it’s running, whether it’s using the tonal gym we have in the house. I, I find exercise, for me, running in particular is, is a great way to just kinda not think about stuff. You know, I, I find when I run, you know, I, I think about, okay, you know, what are some things we wanna do in practice today for basketball? Or if I’ve got, you know, a research project I’m working on, what, what might I wanna think about that? So for me, it’s usually something exercise related. And, and it, as much as I, you know, I have this huge disdain for running. It tends to be my go-to thing though, when I wanna get some exercise and I wanna just kind of forget about

Scott Luton (11:52):

Stuff. Mm. Sounds good to me, Greg.

Greg White (11:55):

I just internalized it and bottle it

Scott Luton (11:57):

Up. <laugh>, <laugh>,

Greg White (12:00):

Sorry. Yeah, I, um, I don’t know. I really, it depends on the day, honestly. Yesterday I went to get fish and chips and sat down next to a couple who had their own stress problems. So after they left, I might have had a cold beverage because they actually did not help me de-stress <laugh>,

Scott Luton (12:20):

You

Greg White (12:20):

Know, sometimes just get a bite, do a lot of nothing. Watch the sunrise. I like Mike, despise running. Absolutely despise it. Still manage to do a walk or run, walk almost every day. And then I’ll quit for a while, because did I mention I despise it? Yeah. But I, you know, it, it just depends on the day. I mean, honestly, I kind of am really good at just shrugging stress off. I usually try to resolve whatever is cause causing me stress in some way.

Scott Luton (12:52):

Okay. Um, all right. Uh, I liked your first answer

Greg White (12:56):

About, just

Scott Luton (12:57):

To be clear, in case

Greg White (12:58):

Was left,

Scott Luton (12:59):

I like your first answer. Balling it up reminds me of that movie from, uh,

Greg White (13:04):

Way down deep inside there. Yes. We talk about it again.

Scott Luton (13:08):

There’s that Michael Douglas movie back from the late eighties, uh, what was the name of that? Falling Down? Down? Yes.

Greg White (13:16):

Actually, that was from Ricky Bobby from,

Scott Luton (13:18):

Oh, Was Night

Scott Luton (13:19):

<laugh>. Wait, uh, y’all let us know. Uh, so Catherine’s talking about running is her go-to for de-stressing beautiful views on the trails up there, North Georgia, where she lives. It’s a great pretty picture. Ts squared’s talking about how price gouging is also adding to the stress is a great point there. He was talking about, I think, Little Debbie’s or Honey Buns yesterday, but great to have you with us, a Squire holding down the Fort Force on YouTube. You know, I think spending time with the kids, you know, some folks that might be, that might add stress and some days, but I like, one of my favorite things to do when I have time is picking up the kids from school and being the first people they talk to as they get in the car. And, and hearing, sometimes hearing their daily challenges makes mine just kind of melt away. All right. So, Reggie, you’re tuned in looking for some information on locking in freight contracts. We may be able to touch on that today, but we’ll definitely be touching on it on future episodes. And yes, we’re all growing some gray hair based on some of the things we’re seeing out there in the freight end supply chain space. So we’ll try to get that. Great to have you here today.

Greg White (14:17):

Uh, I just got some news that should reduce stress for anyone who is an NFL fan.

Scott Luton (14:22):

Okay.

Greg White (14:23):

The Snyder family has just hired a Bank of America’s securities team to explore selling the commanders.

Scott Luton (14:31):

Wow. Okay.

Greg White (14:32):

Getting the Snyders out of NFL football is a boon to every single football fan.

Scott Luton (14:39):

All right. Around the world, man.

Greg White (14:41):

When we just get rid of the Dolphins owner, also

Scott Luton (14:43):

<laugh>. So come here for your sports update. You go for Cowboys updates and your football business news updates as well. Uh, thanks to Mike and to Greg <laugh>. Uh, so we’ll see. We’ll see how quickly that happens. So I wanna switch over to something of course, that everyone’s talking about. Everyone’s feeling, you know, we just rolled off probably one of the most expensive Halloweens of the year. I’m scared to even look at the estimates of what your average Thanksgiving meal’s gonna cost this year, inflationary environment. So a quick data point that most folks should already be familiar with, uh, as reported by our friends at NBC News through last September. So, uh, September, 2022, the 12 month inflation rate hit 8.2%. Right? So, I wanna start with, Mike, What are some of the things that you’re seeing companies do to navigate this inflationary environment?

Mike Griswold (15:35):

Yeah, there, I if, if I can figure out how to post one of our articles on LinkedIn, I will do that. We’ve written a lot on supply chain and in, and inflation and, and the R word, right? With the recession word. Mm. Two things. As I was looking at my notes from one of the short notes we wrote around this, that, that really resonated me. The first is around the sn o p process, and how can companies bring the cost element into your S N O P discussions so that as you’re thinking about, you know, medium to long term planning, that process now has cost considerations into it and the potential of changing costs. And how might that change how you think about matching demand and supply. The second one that is a little bit, probably a little bit more tactical, which is get rid of discretionary inventory.

Mike Griswold (16:25):

Now that presupposes that companies have gone through the exercise that, that says, this is the classification of inventory that I have. You know, here’s some healthy inventory, here’s some unhealthy inventory. Right? Companies need to get rid of that discretionary unhealthy inventory as quickly as they can. And then they need to be smarter around where are we gonna invest in upcoming inventory? And, and, and I’m sure this will be obvious to everyone, but try to avoid investing in inventory that has some link to market volatility, right? Try to invest in inventory that’s gonna be relatively stable, even if we go through an increased, um, you know, pricing environment that we’re in today. So the one that I thought was the most interesting was the S N O P one, especially, and Greg will appreciate this. If we think about retail, right now we’re just kind of sorting out the sn o p process. And for us it’s primarily around quantities. How much do I need? Where do I have it? When do I need it? We haven’t really matured into that financial element of sn o p, all the other industries that are a lot more mature than in, in sn o p should really be thinking about that costing component. Is it baked into your s and o p process? And how is it forming decisions in the medium to long term?

Scott Luton (17:41):

Hmm. Greg, what would you add to that?

Greg White (17:43):

Well, I like Reggie’s kind of off THEC cuff comment on that topic there. Some of them are thrown outta business.

Scott Luton (17:51):

<laugh> Richie tells it like it’s huh

Greg White (17:54):

Uh, Yeah, Right. I mean, more will I, I, you know what, I think what I haven’t seen that I think a lot of of consumers are starting to get frustrated wish, which will shift demand, is they’ve continued to see inflation and corporate profits rise, which means the retailers, the manufacturers, the brands, they are not sharing in the pain that the consumer is seeing. And I don’t know that I would expect them to, but ac margin, do I want to be clear for those who are angry about this out there, margin dollars are increasing for retailers because we keep paying the price, by the way. And the, but margin percentage is not increasing in a lot of cases. It’s just because the volume, they’re, they’re making the same gross market. 26% on $2 is bigger than 26% on $1. So it in dollars, I should say. So I think that that is one thing that I’m seeing is I’m starting to see a little bit of consumer backlash on that and starting to see some awareness of retailers on that. So I expect us to have, if you’re a, oh gosh, what was the, the movie anyway, expect us to start having some schooner tuna, uh, commercials. The tuna with heart, Right?

Scott Luton (19:08):

Right.

Greg White (19:09):

And if anybody doesn’t know, you can just Google Schooner tuna and you’ll see the video.

Scott Luton (19:14):

Isn’t that Hamburger Helper, I think is the brand. It would put out that, uh, those tuna mills, Greg, is that what you’re saying? Remember the, the Hand with the Heart and it had a whole line of Hamburger helper products? Is that who you’re,

Greg White (19:26):

Uh, no, this is what, what is the name of the movie? It had Michael Keaton, I think. Okay. And, um,

Mike Griswold (19:32):

Oh, you’re, you’re thinking, you’re thinking night shift. We’re gonna, we’re gonna, yeah, we’re gonna feed the tune of Fish Bandaid.

Greg White (19:38):

You can’t feed Chili to a Baby is the other

Mike Griswold (19:40):

Famous. Oh, okay.

Greg White (19:43):

It was Terry Gar and either Michael Keaton or Tom Hanks. I cannot believe I still get those two guys confused. But, um, anyway, she goes to work because he gets laid off from his high paying job, and she just absolutely,

Scott Luton (19:56):

Oh, Mr.

Mike Griswold (19:57):

Mom, Mr. Mom,

Greg White (19:58):

Mr. Mom. There it is. Yes, yes. Thank

Mike Griswold (20:00):

You. That is Michael King,

Greg White (20:02):

Mr. Mom, the schooner tuna. Yes. We’ll reduce our prices during these difficult times, but as time, you know, as the economy relaxes, whatever, we’ll go back to our regular price.

Scott Luton (20:14):

Yep.

Greg White (20:15):

Good. Tune it, tune

Mike Griswold (20:16):

It with a heart. I, I think the other thing, the other thing that’s happening, I think is people are really having that need versus want discussion. Yeah. What do you always have with your kids? Right? Your kids? I need a cell phone. No, you don’t. You want a cell phone. So that need versus want is really, I think, climbing up the consumer decision tree. And I think we’re finding less energy on the want right now because of prices. And, you know, let, let’s now forget that inflation affects everything. So you’ve got people making trade off decisions between scooter, tuna and gas in the car. So I can go to work, Right? You’ve got, you know, gas in the car versus do I pay all the electric bill? So this whole need versus one thing I think is really ratcheted up and has been ratchet it up over the last probably 12 months.

Scott Luton (21:10):

Yep.

Greg White (21:10):

It’s a good point. Because savings are declining, right? People saved a lot of the stimulus check that they got. Savings are declining. Personal credit is increasing. The specter of unemployment is definitely out there. You know, we have high employment, largely because we have a bunch of volunteers who are outside the employment market. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, we talked about this yesterday. 7 million able bodied men, and I mean, men, just men who are choosing not to work right now, even though they’re ample jobs available for it. You know, I think we all have this sort of question of why are there so many jobs available and yet so many people who aren’t working, not out of work, but aren’t working. So,

Scott Luton (21:54):

All right, so moving right along. I gotta bring teeth Squared’s comment back in here cuz it wasn’t honey buns he was talking about yesterday in some of the price gouging and inflationary pricing, it was Tasty Cakes and I believe it was $3 and 98 cents is what the going rate is

Greg White (22:08):

From like a Buck 60 or something. Yeah.

Scott Luton (22:10):

Right? Yeah. Uh, so ts squared, thank you for these, uh, these pulses in the market, uh, on these important products. I’m partial little Debbie’s, especially Fudge rounds, star crunches, Cosmic Brownies, Mike and Greg. Now we’re talking my language, my bringing, All right, so moving right along. So from, I appreciate y’all’s take on how companies and business leaders are navigating some of y’all’s initial observations there. I wanna move into this story about Amazon because some internal documents came out. This, this comes from our friends at Popular Science, which by the way, 150 years they’re celebrating. And if you ever got popular science, my favorite part as a kid was they would take a look back of the technologies that they forecasted was coming and they’d look back a hundred years, they’d look back 50 years and look back 20 years. And it was the best part, I think one of the best parts of magazine. But nevertheless, Amazon’s employee retention and their turnover rates in particular maybe costing the company some 8 billion as in Bezos per year. So, Mike, talk to us about this, uh, this report here.

Mike Griswold (23:13):

So let, let me preface all this by saying, right, this was not public made publicly available by Amazon, it was leak. So let’s, you know, in, in some ways, let’s maybe take it with a grain of salt, right? Having said that though, and, and I may need help with the math, right? 8 billion. This, um, as you read it was, was across multiple tiers of employee level. Everything from management to people down in the warehouse. So if you were to say, let’s just, let’s use a round number cuz I need easy math of a hundred thousand dollars, uh, uh, an associate that’s 80,000, thousand people, I think right? That Amazon is turning over. And even if we say that’s half right, it’s 4 billion, that’s 40,000 people. So there’s an issue there, right? And I think the issue for the broader population is, are we focused enough on attracting, but probably are we, are we over-emphasizing the retaining part within our workforce?

Mike Griswold (24:13):

Hmm. And we’ve talked a lot on here with some of our Gartner research around moving from location centric work to human centric work, recognizing through the pandemic that not everything has to be done in an office. Uh, even people like Amazon that have warehouse and manufacturing jobs, there’s things you can do within that environment to create more human-centric work. So to me, this is an, an indication of a company that is not alone in struggling with retention. And to me, if retention isn’t something the C-suite is talking about, then you’re gonna end up like Amazon. You’re not eight b I mean, there’s probably only one company on the planet that could afford 8 billion in associate turnover, and that’s Amazon. But other organizations will have order of magnitude that is it, that is impactful to them if we’re not focusing on retention. And to me, that needs to be one of the top of mind things for all organizations supply chain and the rest of the organization. How are we engaging our associates? What are we doing consciously to drive retention? And are we listening to our associates when they talk to us about the things they wanna do, their career aspirations and, and what do they wanna do about the job environment? To me, this would send all kinds of alarm bells off for me. Again, even if we say it’s only half true around major retention issues for, for people that aren’t named Amazon as well. Right. Greg?

Greg White (25:49):

I think one thing you have to remember is this is a company that hires 120,000 people just for peak season. Yeah. So, yes, of course their turnover is gonna be enormous. Right? And a lot of the jobs that they hire people for are transitional transitory, even the warehouse workers. We’ve seen a a trend with people staying away in droves as I like to stay, say, from dark, dirty, dangerous, and dull jobs. And there are plenty of those in an Amazon warehouse. So I think, I don’t know if we should be shocked by this number, right? I mean, the company just receded below $1 trillion in valuation just yesterday. So $8 billion is a rounding error for them. Yeah. So I, I do think all of what Mike said, however, is true for Amazon and for everyone else. And it’s, it’s going to to be particularly important considering what we talked about just a few minutes ago with inflation and recession and whatever other economic transition we’re going to experience.

Greg White (26:54):

Yep. Uh, we’ve already started to see the trend of baby boomers coming back into the workforce because their stock portfolios got crushed, therefore their retirement has been crushed. And now they answer, they can now answer the question, What the heck am I doing this for anyway? So, and it is for, for the money. So, I mean, I think there’s a lot in transition here. There’s a lot of, I don’t know what I wanna say, activist employees at Amazon. And I’m not a huge, I’m not like a huge advocate of Amazon, though I am a shareholder, full disclosure. But I think I have 13 shares <laugh>

Scott Luton (27:34):

That’s out for the takeover from Greg White. That’s

Mike Griswold (27:36):

Right. That’s right.

Greg White (27:38):

But, but this is something that we need to be concerned about because we’re also in a transitional employment period where because people are staying away from certain jobs or they’re transitory in these certain jobs, those jobs are gonna go to automation and they’re gonna have to integrate with the people who have satisfying jobs and who want to stay in those jobs and who want to continue to do the kind of work that they’re doing. And they’re gonna be doing it instead of with human beings, with robots or other automation or autonomous. So you have to be very conscious of what is keeping or driving away people in your enterprise.

Mike Griswold (28:15):

Right. Yeah. I think maybe a couple other thoughts, Scott, cause I know you wanna move on. I, I think Amazon’s a good example. I think particularly if you think about the warehouse side of the house is what are you measuring? How are you incenting people? And and what, how does that drive the culture around whether people wanna stay or go mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And I think that that’s not, I’m not saying that the way Amazon does it is wrong. All I’m saying is, as in any organization, you need to look at the measures and the metrics that you’re signaling are important. Yep. And how does that align with how people see themselves and how they value their job. The second thing is in the, in that, in that, um, note, it talks about regretted and unre regretted. I think the other takeaway from this is when you have, you know, unre regretted attrition, part of the exercise needs to be why.

Mike Griswold (29:08):

Right? And you have to be willing to hear the feedback around why people are leaving. And you can’t just gloss it over around, you know, some, some transitory type of things or, or or other kind of surface level reasons people are leaving. You need to dig deeper and really understand and, and be very reflective and be open to that reflectiveness around why people are leaving. I mean, one of the things we, we talk about at Gartner is when we think, think about this topic, and Greg, you hit on it, is why stay? So we spend a lot of time with people at Gartner saying, Why are you staying with us again? Not that we want you to leave, but we wanna understand why do you stay? What are the things you like about the job? What are the things that keep you wanting to stay with us? And I think more organizations when they, when they look at that regretted versus unre regretted should be thinking about why are people staying? To your point, Greg, and how do we amplify that? That to me, that that’s gonna be a huge issue for us over the next 12 day, 18 months, is this broader talent discussion.

Scott Luton (30:18):

Yep.

Greg White (30:18):

It’s too infrequent that companies ask the question what is going right? They always ask the question, what is going wrong or what’s gone wrong? But what is going right is critical to reinforcing the behavior or the, or the operations or the outcomes that you want to continue in your organization.

Scott Luton (30:36):

Right? The the employee, uh, the employee idea, uh, bucket isn’t good enough. Uh, Right. A little tip of the hat to Michael Scott, the office. Right. It’s not good enough. You gotta lean in, you gotta be engaged, you gotta seek out the information, whether it’s easy to hear or not. Yeah. Lean in. And then of course, once you gather it, you gotta take action and do something about it, uh, to protect the team you have and and, and to improve your overall talent management approach. So Mike and Greg appreciate your, your perspective here today. I just wanna point something out cause it just dawned on me. So going back to this graphic here, you know, Greg, we’ve done over a thousand shows on the main channel, hundreds of live streams and webinars, and this is the first time we’ve ever referenced a story at Popular Science.

Scott Luton (31:16):

Popular Science. Right? So kudos to that team for jumping into the Amazon news and, and sharing these reported findings. Uh, and <laugh> getting aside 150 years. That is something certainly to, uh, celebrate. Okay. So now we’re getting to, uh, an interesting story that’s not new. It’s been around for at least a few weeks here. Many outlets from the Wall Street Journal to hear in this case CNN Business have been reporting on Kroger’s plans to purchase Albertsons. Now here, the interesting twist on Couch, the perspective you’re gonna hear from Mike and Greg and myself, perhaps, we’re a big Kroger family, we’re in there every day. It seems like we live near by a one of their experiential big mega stores where they try all kinds of new things and kind of see how it resonates. So the, the good old Kroger Smart card, they’ve been gathering data for me for Amanda for decades it feels like. And Mike, interesting little take here. You were, I believe in supply chain at Albertson’s earlier in your career. Is that right, Mike?

Mike Griswold (32:11):

Correct. Just before we got bought by Super Value. Uh, okay. That was kind of the impetus for I’m not leaving Boise, Idaho for Minneapolis, Minnesota. And that kinda, that kind of golfing

Greg White (32:23):

Season is too short.

Mike Griswold (32:24):

I I, I don’t wanna upset, you know, I don’t wanna add Houston Astro fans, Macy customers and people that live in Minneapolis to the list of hate mail we’re gonna get. But I wasn’t making that move. Uh, and that, that was kind of the impetus to the whole analyst journey that we spent some time talking about last month. So yes. All right. I have had some experience with them.

Scott Luton (32:43):

So I’m looking forward to get you and Greg’s take on why some of the why they would do this. Obviously a lot of folks are familiar with, uh, you know, Walmart getting more and more into the grocery game and Kroger and Albertson’s together. There’s a much bigger footprint, some of the reasons. But, uh, Mike just in general, and then Greg, Mike, talk to us about what you see with this potential

Mike Griswold (33:02):

Merger. Yeah, it’s interesting. My early days at amr when, when I would talk to, you know, Kroger and Albertsons and Safeway, who was by themselves at the time, you know, when, when, when you would overlay the map of the United States there, there was a lot of overlap between any two of them, right? But when you looked at all three of them together, which is now really what we’re talking about, they pretty much cover now the United States, which I, I think this is to your, to your comments guy. This is, this is a reaction to, you know, where Walmart has gone with grocery, uh, and, and the strength and the presence and just the share that Walmart has in grocery. You know, I think this is probably something that w that was inevitable and whether it was, although I think back in my AMR days, I would’ve thought it was more likely that it would’ve been Safeway who would’ve bought the other two than where we landed with Kroger.

Mike Griswold (33:58):

I think though fast forwarding today, I think the right company, Kroger of those three is the right one to now have kind of the control and influence over the three. Kroger has always struck me, whether it’s, it’s what you talked about in terms of the customer intelligence, they’ve always been pretty sophisticated for a food retailer in the technology space. A lot of investment. You talked about the innovation store, a lot of investment in technology. They’ve got a really good culture around innovation and technology. So I, I think overall the right company is now kind of shepherding these other two through the journey. There are going to be for those people that, that like to, to watch the ftc, this is gonna be a circus you’ve already started to re to read about what’s gonna have to happen in terms of divestitures. You’ve already heard, um, Albertson’s talk about to maybe get ahead of the divestitures spinning off similar to they did when they got bought by Super value, you know, spinning off a small 200 store chain that I don’t know where or what it’s gonna do.

Mike Griswold (35:06):

Right. But there’s a lot more, I mean, the people that are gonna get rich on this are the FTC lawyers for sure, which always happens in a merger. And acquisitions especially of this size. I’m excited for this because I do think if there’s someone that, that can give Walmart a run for their money relative to technology and innovation, it’s always been Kroger. I think there’s good infrastructure in Albertson’s and Safeway. I think culturally overall, I think it’s a pretty good fit in terms of the, the Albert and the Kroger culture in particular, I think are pretty well aligned in terms of, you know, acting locally, but trying to govern more broadly. Yep. So I I, I think this is gonna be a good deal once it finally gets sorted out. There’ll be a lot of chaos until it gets sorted out. But I think Kroger was, is the right one to come out.

Mike Griswold (36:02):

I don’t wanna say cow come out on top, it wasn’t really a competition, but I do think of those three big ones that you had. Yep. Kroger being the one that’s driving the bus, I think is a good thing. All right. Uh, and I think it’s a good thing for, a good thing for the market. I think it’s a great thing for the supermarket industry who’ve always been laggers with maybe the, except with, with the exception of Kroger for sure, when it comes to technology and innovation. So I, I, I’m excited to see where this goes.

Scott Luton (36:30):

Okay. So, you know, uh, really quick, Greg, I’m coming to you next, but, uh, Kroger’s also been leading the way in terms of rolling out those, uh, self checkout lanes that we’ve talked about before. I’m a big fan of, Cause we can purchase as many dog treats and little Debbie’s and not be judged for it, you know, cause we’re, we’re self check it out. So little, little, that little tidbit about how Kroger runs at stores. Greg, what’s your take on Kroger Albertson’s pending marriage?

Greg White (36:56):

I agree with the core precept that Mike talked about. The Kroger is the right company to lead here. So I’m from Kansas. There was a little tiny chain of grocery stores called Dylans. And when Kroger bought them, they elevated the CEO of this tiny grocery store chain, David Dillon to CEO role at Kroger. And to me, not only does that show a certain openness, but but a really kind of collaborative spirit that you see as well. Because they also allow some of their really premier brands to keep their label right here on Hilton Head, we have Harris Teeter, which is a legendary grocery brand in the southeast, particularly in South Carolina, and oh, well along the coast anyway, and Kroger stores. And they’ve allowed them to have their distinct personalities even within like five miles of one a three miles, I dunno, small island, whatever. They’re very close to one another.

Greg White (37:53):

And they did the same with Dylan for a good long while. And they did with fries and other companies that they have bought over time. And they’ve integrated them very well. And they have created the efficiencies with some local control that Mike has talked about. I just think they do it right. And look, this was largely a defensive move for the collection of other grocers other than Walmart, right? They have to get bigger to be able to compete with Walmart effectively because they need the volume discounts and whatever else that, that they can tackle. Plus they need to modernize how grocery is done. So much, much of the store is still done by merchandisers, right? It’s manual, it’s emotional. Here’s how much space I have, I’m gonna fill that space with Cheerios or whatever it is, right? They need to think a little bit more scientifically and they need to automate a lot of what’s going on.

Greg White (38:51):

And this gives them a scale that they can definitely do that undertake what I’m sure will be multimillion or maybe even billion dollar implementation of a technology that brings things like complete oversight and understanding of their stock status, of their mixes in the various, you know, product mix in the various stores and what their optimal inventory positions ought to be. So there’s a lot of room for improvement. And with the kind of scale that this gives these organizations, it’ll give them a huge opportunity to, to compete with Walmart, but also just be a better enterprise together than they are separately, right?

Scott Luton (39:30):

Yeah. But not Cheerios. It’s, it’s, it’s gotta be Fruit Loops, Fruity Pebbles, anything but Cheerios and especially not Honeynut Cheerios. Goodness gracious. Those things are horrible. <laugh>

Mike Griswold (39:39):

<laugh>, I, yeah, I’m, I I I would prefer a Frosted Flakes analogy than,

Greg White (39:45):

Oh my gosh. Anyway, you’re right. General Mills, right? Yeah. Frosted Flakes is a much better cereal.

Mike Griswold (39:53):

The, um, the, the point you made, Greg, I just wanted to amplify cuz it’s, it’s spot on, which is the things that Kroger does well, were already kind of building blocks that were in place in Albertson’s and in Safeway, I’ll take the loyalty as an example, right? Safeway already doing mining, you know, pretty much on par with what Kroger was doing. Albertson’s was, was in the early stages of that. So Kroger can elevate that there, there’s a lot of areas within those two companies that they already had been working on that I think Kroger can take them to the next level. The one challenge I do see with Albertsons in particular is the big challenge when you compete against Walmart is ultimately it does come down to price and service. Albertsons has tended to skew in their markets on the higher price side. And I think customers would debate whether they were getting service, the service equivalent for that.

Mike Griswold (40:47):

So I think one of the challenges Kroger might have is, is how do we bring kind of that lower price competitive dynamic within the Albertsons footprint. Safeway, I would argue, well they may have said they wanted to compete at the higher end of price. They were really a price competitor. So I think that DNA that Kroger brings is also gonna be good because at the end of the day, you do have to find a way to competitively compete on price against Walmart. And then where are you gonna provide differentiation like that targeted marketing and loyalty that, that Kroger has an incredible strength is. And I also agree, Greg Kroger of all the food retailers, certainly has been doing a lot of really exciting things around automation and innovation. And it was already, I think, think doing really, really well in e-commerce, which is gonna be that other battleground when it comes to food retailing is, you know, order online collect and store Kroger doing that really, really well and I think has another opportunity to elevate both Albertsons and Safeway in that area as well. So, again, agree with Greg. I I think that the right company is, is driving the bus in this

Scott Luton (41:54):

One. Yep.

Greg White (41:55):

Hey Scott, before we move off, Yeah, I have to, my mom is required that I do this. Whenever we talk about Dylan’s David Dylan to David Dillon. I just wanna apologize again for my dad giving you an f in speech class when you were in

Mike Griswold (42:10):

High school.

Greg White (42:11):

She, she, my mom literally, that’s, that’s the story she tells the next day David was carrying her groceries out from the store and she was so embarrassed and he said, and this is a talk about the words of a future leader. It’s okay, Mrs. White, I deserve,

Scott Luton (42:31):

So one last comment here. Natalie, uh, who lived in Cincinnati, I think she’s in the Charlotte area now, speaking to what Greg was talking about, kind of that local, uh, flavor. Natalie says Kroger does that within their own chain. They lived in Cincinnati for years. Each location was geared to the local, you know, five mile radius or so. That’s a good thing. Okay, so lot more to come on the Kroger’s Albertson’s story. I want to, uh, on this next, this, this is going to have to be a quick hitter. Um, there’s a great article here from Market Watch about kinda the supply chain outlook for the holiday shopping season that evidently we’re already in. It’s not even upcoming these days that we’re already in it. You know, what’s in stock, what’s not gonna be in stock. Uh, so Mike and Greg, just a couple quick observations cause I definitely wanna get to that final question about, um, uh, not only what’s what’s going on at Gartner, but also, uh, any tips for folks moving ahead in their career. So a quick observation around the supply chain outlook for the holiday shopping season, Mike.

Mike Griswold (43:26):

Yeah, I I I think it’s gonna be another tough one just because of some of the things you already talked about, inflation recession. I think we’re still dealing with supply constraints in general all across the supply chain. Yep. My advice to those of us that are gonna be shoppers is, is have a solid plan B. Right? If you want a widget X, be ready to settle for widget y Right? And be okay with that. I think as organizations we also need to have thoughts around, if I can’t get enough inventory to supply my customers in, in X, what can I offer them? And y so it, it’s, there’s gonna be a, there’s gonna need to be, you know, I think this holiday season, I would maybe under subtitle it the year of contingency planning for both shoppers and for organizations.

Scott Luton (44:17):

Excellent. Uh, Greg, your quick thought.

Greg White (44:19):

I agree with Mike, it’s gonna be a very soft holiday season and not just because of the difficulty of getting things, but it appears that everyone but Macy’s is gonna have this landscape of leftovers from products that didn’t get out on the shelf Yeah. Last Christmas or during the rest of the year because it arrived late. So maybe Macy’s is an actual, maybe a really big winner this holiday season, but I fear that hardly anyone else will be

Scott Luton (44:47):

<laugh>. Well, I, I would just add to all of our listeners out there, this could be a great year to focus in on presence with the P R E S C E N

Greg White (44:57):

1. No, cce

Scott Luton (44:58):

N I might feel speech too, like David Dylan. Yeah. And not presence the, the objects, right? I mean, hey, going back to I think what Mike shared, just be grateful for what you get, uh, and not overly choosy, uh, because I’ll tell you between the supply chain of, you know, supply challenges we’ve seen on a variety of products to just how much everything costs. Goodness gracious, It’d be a good time to celebrate being with your family and loved ones. Okay, so I’ve got 1249. We’re coming down the home stretch very quickly, Mike and Greg. So we get this question all the time. We did, We happened as Murphy’s Law goes. We did not get it today, but that’s okay. We’re gonna answer anyway. Uh, so Mike and Greg, give me one thing. We always get the question special in this series, you know, how can I break into supply chain or how can I move up that career ladder? Mike, what’s one, one way that you’d encourage folks to answer that question these days?

Mike Griswold (45:49):

So, when I think about how we go through the, the analyst hiring process, you know, one of the things, and even as I think about we’re coming into our end of year kind of appraisal review season, one of the words or kind of collection of words we talk about a lot is behaviors. And what behaviors have people demonstrated. My advice to people that are early in the market or looking to, to move through the market is put yourself in situations where you can demonstrate behaviors. What’s happening is resumes and skills and education is all starting to look very similar. Hmm. So, you know, if your resume, you know, if you went to Michigan State, uh, with a supply chain degree, you’re not alone in that. Right? And if you’re in the top 10% of your class with a Michigan State supply chain degree, guess what?

Mike Griswold (46:42):

There’s 10% of you that that, that have basically a similar resume. What’s gonna differentiate people as behaviors? Where can you demonstrate to us those leadership behaviors, those ability to collaborate behaviors, those where you’ve been able to communicate maybe different idea behaviors? That’s my biggest piece of advice is differentiate yourself on experiences and behaviors. Don’t try to differentiate, differentiate yourself around what typically in the past may have been important on a resume. Kind of those very, this is where I went to school, these are the jobs that I’ve had. It’s about behaviors and experiences. At least that’s been my experience.

Scott Luton (47:26):

Yep. Well said Mike, Greg,

Greg White (47:28):

Uh, forget terms like, work your wage or act your wage and quiet quitting because you won’t have to quit or you won’t be working your wage either because layoffs are coming probably even in the supply chain industry. And those will be the people that will go first. I’m not saying to work in an 80 hour week either, but don’t shortchange yourself by not gaining the experience of hard work in the supply chain and the experience that you get from interacting with other human beings. So, to your point of presence, Scott Luden, be present. I, I mean, I think there, I love the flexibility of remote work, but you cannot deny even people who are huge advocates. We, I have this debate all the time. Even people who are huge advocates of remote work, recognize, acknowledge, and I think relish the opportunity to get in front of people and solve in two minutes something you’ve been working on for two weeks, even collaboratively mm-hmm. <affirmative>, but distance like this. So start to think about how you can make your job more satisfying by being present, being more engaged and, and being more active. And it’s hard to differentiate yourself other than that, in my

Scott Luton (48:44):

Opinion. Well, and also remember, uh, it’s easy relatively speaking to deliver when times are easy, but, uh, Mike and Greg are kind of both speaking to differentiations when times get tough, which you can really stick out with what you bring to the table. So Mike and Greg, wonderful conversation. I should just share T Square it says, Honey Nut Cheerios is a banga. Don’t slander that one. Now I’m new to Banga. I don’t know, uh, what,

Greg White (49:10):

That’s what he means. It’s a banger.

Scott Luton (49:12):

Oh,

Greg White (49:12):

<laugh> banger

Scott Luton (49:13):

<laugh>. Gotcha. All right. How

Greg White (49:16):

You

Scott Luton (49:17):

<laugh>? And by the way, Jason joins today. Jason, hope your newest addition to the, uh, family, which is probably a couple months old now, is doing well. Okay. So Mike, before you leave us, and hopefully you give us just an extra second or two on the, uh, exit button, Mike, talk to us. What’s the latest going on with Gartner? What should folks be on the lookout for and how can folks connect with

Mike Griswold (49:37):

You? Yeah, so the, the usual connections, LinkedIn gartner.com, we are heads down now planning for our two supply chain symposium, early May in Orlando, first week in June in London, and I think it, or sorry, Barcelona, and I think I teed up last time. I also want people to start thinking about October and November. We’re gonna do, um, two planning summits. So smaller events geared specifically for people that do planning. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, uh, we did one in 2019 pre Covid was incredibly successful in Denver and we had plans to roll them out, but then Covid got in the way. So right now really focused on what do we wanna deliver for our events.

Scott Luton (50:18):

Love that. And how can folks, uh, connect with you? I know you’re getting better and better incrementally at LinkedIn, right? Yeah.

Mike Griswold (50:24):

Incrementally is the key word, Scott. Yes. LinkedIn. And then, uh, really email mike duck griswold gar.com. I, I have turned off the fax machine, so please don’t fax me, but email, email is probably the best incrementally better at LinkedIn.

Scott Luton (50:41):

And if you put something golf related in a subject line, you probably have a slightly more better

Mike Griswold (50:47):

Yes. Or, or, or basketball. Yes. Yes.

Scott Luton (50:51):

Right. Always a pleasure to spend time with one of the smartest guys that we know here. Uh, Mike Griswold with Gartner. Mike, always a pleasure. If we don’t talk with you, have a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday and we’ll have you back in December. Looking forward to that already. Thank you, Mike. Sounds good.

Mike Griswold (51:04):

Me too. Thanks everyone.

Scott Luton (51:09):

Man, we covered around the world and then some in, uh, 50 minutes just about after our opening about Yeah. A variety of things. So, Greg, uh, other than hunting up Cheerios, you know, Mike dropped a ton of a truckload is always of, of great insights and expertise and things that consider folks out there. What was one of your favorite things he shared here today?

Greg White (51:31):

Well, I think his insights around getting into supply chain are particularly valuable. Who could know better than he does? Right? I mean, he talks to virtually all of the major employers in supply chain, whether they’re practitioners or service providers or technology providers. He knows what it takes to, you know, to make your way in supply chain. It’s not his job to know that, but he just talks to these companies about things like retention and hiring and what they’re looking for in people to make their organization more successful. That’s gotta be my, my favorite also, sorry, you said pick one, but I’m gonna pick two. I love it when we get to hear him talk about something he really, really knows intimately, like Albertsons. I mean, he worked there. Just fantastic that he get that he’s got the opportunity to do that. And I think a lot of people might have been a homer in that, and Albertsons should have been the surviving entity, but the way that he breaks down why it makes sense that Kroger is that, whatever you wanna say, surviving guiding entity in that makes perfect sense. So, and, and it’s, you know, it’s an incredibly mature position to take. So, which is nothing less than we would expect for Mike

Mike Griswold (52:45):

<laugh>.

Scott Luton (52:46):

Good stuff. I, I, the whole conversation was a, a neat, when I was excited as we were putting the, uh, kinda the framework of the show, uh, together earlier. A lot of good stuff. I enjoyed your perspective as always, Greg. Uh, you and Mike are quite the one, two punch. Always enjoy these monthly and folks, in case you don’t know, uh, and again, I think we, this is our third year, uh, but it’s the first Wednesday of each month, right? 12 in Eastern time. Now, say that because next month we’re getting a little exception and, you know, there’s plenty of exceptions in supply chain. Next is the first Thursday of December is gonna be, uh, Mike Griswold’s appearance here at Supply Chain now. So y’all check that out, tune in, bring your questions, bring your observations and be prepared for a great conversation.

Greg White (53:27):

But also come on Wednesday because we’ll have something pretty special that day as well.

Scott Luton (53:31):

That is right. And it’ll be a whole lot better than canned cranberry sauce on your Turkey sandwiches, which is no good. All right. So, uh, enough about that. Uh, thanks everybody. You know, Reggie teas squared. Jason, Natalie PB dropped in earlier. Uh, Scott Boudreau, great to have you here. Of course, Katherine Manda, all the folks we didn’t hit. Uh, y’all get ready. Be back with us Monday’s our next live show. Monday for the supply chain Buzz 12 New Eastern Time where we also walked through the latest and greatest some, the best, uh, most important news headlines of the day, Greg. Always a pleasure knock shows that with you.

Greg White (54:06):

Yep. Likewise, appreciate it. You are the master of not just ceremonies, but team discussion that occurs in supply chain.

Scott Luton (54:14):

Uh, you’re too kind, but folks, whatever you do, uh, hey, act on some of what you heard here today. It’s all about deeds, not words, right? Differentiate yourself. Find a way. There’s plenty of ways to find that, but most importantly, do good, give forward and be the change that’s needed. And with that set up, see you next time. Right back here on Supply Chain now. Thanks everybody.

Intro/Outro (54:33):

Thanks for being a part of our supply chain Now, community. Check out all of our programming@supplychainnow.com and make sure you subscribe to Supply Chain now, anywhere you listen to podcasts. And follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Instagram. See you next time on Supply Chain Now.