Order winners

Order winners—Those competitive characteristics that cause a firm s customers to choose that firm s goods and services over those of its competitors. Order winners can be considered to be competitive advantages for the firm. Order winners usually focus on one (rarely more than two) of the following strategic initiatives price/cost, quality, delivery speed, delivery reliability, product design, flexibility, after-market service, and image. 

Which criteria best describes your order quaiifiers and order winners for a customer segment ... 

Fig. 9.4 Listing of criteria describing order qualifiers and order winners , referring to Gilmour et al. (1994)...

However, the most important issues to be determined in this context with regard to the requirements of a specific customer segment are the order qualifiers and order winners . This concept, initially developed by Hill in 1985 (Hill 1993), comes from the field of manufacturing theory. Christopher and Towill (2000), however, adapted it and developed a wider supply chain oriented concept. 

The order winners by contrast are those characteristics that cause a firm s customer to choose the product or service over those of its competitors (Christopher and Towill 2000). 

Based on a survey, Gilmour et al. (1994) generated a ranking of criteria which are important for satisfying the customers depicted in Fig. 9.4. Hence, it shall be determined which criteria describe the order qualifiers and the order winners hest as requirements that a given customer segment possesses. 

Whatever technique is used it is important to understand which are the qualifiers and which are the order winners amongst the different customer groups. This understanding must then drive the design of the supply chain processes that will enable success in the marketplace. 

Order winners are factors that directly and significantly help products to win orders in the marketplace. Customers regard such factors as key reasons for buying that product or service. If a firm raises its performance on those factors, it will increase its chances of getting more business. Thus a product that competes mainly on price would benefit in the marketplace if productivity improvements enabled further price reductions. 

Increased performance in an order winner, shown by the solid line, increases... 

Order winners Price Time-to-market Brand/label Quality... 

Select the top two product lines (in terms of sales) for your firm or one that you know well. Using the headings in Table 1.1, fill in the details for characteristics of both product lines. Aim to use precise details, so identify the actual sales figures instead of putting high or low. Use additional or other headings if they describe the situation better. Go on to identify the principal order winners and qualifiers for each product. 

Logistics strategy usually demands systemic strategy setting between network partners, who may have to coordinate order winners and qualifiers across different market segments. 

What were the order winners and order qualifiers at TA ... 

The relative importance of logistics performance objectives varies from one situation to another. It can also vary over time. The concept of order winners... 

Characterise the changes using the concept of order winners and qualifiers. 

Sketch out what the basic structure of the new logistics and supplier network might look like. From a lean and an agile supplier s perspective, what would be the order winners and qualifiers in dealing with Aristocrat ... 

Lean thinking (Chapter 6) is concerned primarily with the elimination of waste. The order winners that are especially supported by this mindset are cost and quality. Agility is concerned primarily with supporting order winners of speed and flexible response. Time compression is a fundamental requirement for leanness, but only one of the enablers of agility. 

What the order winners are for example, price, product range, technology advantage, superior product quality. 

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