Distribution Network Strategy
WPI builds a demand-weighted model of your entire distribution network — every DC, every plant, every customer — and runs 3–5 scenarios so you can see the cost and service impact of maintaining, consolidating, or relocating facilities before you commit a dollar.
Leases expire. Demand shifts. What made sense five years ago might be costing you millions today in excess freight, redundant facilities, or service gaps your customers feel but your reports don't show. WPI answers the question with data — not assumptions, not broker recommendations, not "we've always been here."
Five phases. Each one has a clear output. The timeline starts when we receive clean data — not when the retainer starts.
Every deliverable is built to support a decision — not to generate more questions.
Demand-weighted model using actual shipment data (pounds, not revenue) to identify the optimal facility locations for your current and forecasted customer base.
3–5 modeled network configurations with side-by-side cost and service-level tradeoffs. Not just "which is cheapest" — which gives you the best balance of cost, service, and operational feasibility.
Full business case with sensitivity testing across fuel prices and demand shifts. Finance-partner reviewed. Built to survive board-level scrutiny, not just a consultant's slide deck.
Implementation plan tied to your actual lease-event calendar. When to act, in what order, and what triggers each decision. Not a theoretical timeline — one built around your real constraints.
Most network studies are done by freight brokers or big consulting firms. Both have conflicts. We don't.
We don't broker freight, operate warehouses, or lease facilities. Our recommendation is built for your cost structure — we have nothing to route business through.
Our gravity model uses actual pounds moved, not revenue. Revenue masks the real cost of serving a customer. A $500K account 400 miles from your DC costs more to serve than a $200K account 40 miles away — revenue-based models miss that.
You get a business case your CFO can take to the board — not a 200-page report that creates more questions than it answers. Nine weeks, clear deliverables, a recommendation you can act on.
WPI's network optimization methodology was developed inside a national building materials distribution operation with 7 distribution centers — not in a consulting lab. The approach was refined by doing the work: analyzing actual shipment data, modeling real facility decisions, and building the business cases that drove those decisions.
The methodology — demand-weighted gravity modeling, constrained vs. unconstrained scenario comparison, lease-event-triggered execution planning — came from needing to answer a real question with real money behind it. It's the same framework WPI brings to every engagement, adapted to your network, your data, and your constraints.