Parable of the Oat Milk
We have an oat milk problem at Northern Vessel. For the past four years, we've continually experienced these sharp little moments when we've simply run out of it (or nearly ran out). Considering this ingredient is the base of our most famous and best-selling drink (oat milk cold brew latte), running out of oat milk is a disastrous scenario. As recently as a month ago, TJ and I spent one Saturday afternoon driving to every single Target in the metro, hoping to scoop up as many oat milk cartons as possible. With a lot of time and a little luck, we barely scraped together enough to finish our batch of cold brew lattes.
As I continue to grow into my new role inventory management and vendor relationships, I realize that what we've done in the past is some version of white-knuckling. We see we're running low on product, factor in all the supply-and-demand variables we can think of, mathematically calculate how much end product we'll need, mathematically calculate how much oat milk that necessitates, place an order, and hope the delivery timing is in our favor. There are about 10 factors that go into these calculations, each allowing for the possibility of error, and many of which are contextual guesses. That doesn't even include the delivery timing implications.
In comes me. I have a different idea. A simpler idea. After all, simpler is better......always! Here's the new math:
How many cases of oat milk can we store at any given time? 56 (about 168 gallons worth). This is approximately three days' worth of need for us.
How many cases of oat milk do we have left today? At the end of each business day, someone counts how manycases we have remaining and reports it to our inventory management Slack channel. Let's say the answer is 20. We have 20 cases left.
How many cases are needed to restock us fully? 56 cases - 20 cases = 36 cases. 36 cases would fully stock us again.
By 9PM, we place our order for next-day delivery of 36 cases of oat milk. If we are perfect in our execution and our supplier is also perfect, there's 0% chance we ever run out again. If we forget to order or our supplier has an issue, this process still makes it very likely we never run out. No messy math, no brain damage, no forgotten factors.
Simple always wins! It's funny, as I received some pushback on these types of processes internally. Some say it's too simple, lacking the context of all the craziness happening around us. My response to these types of critiques: "Even more reason to keep it simple! We can't afford to let all the changing variables jeopardize our supply chain!"
This really isn't about oat milk. This is a parable for everything in our lives. Our gut instinct is to always make things more complicated, more complex, and more sophisticated. This is ironic, as simpler almost always beats complex. Simple allows us to keep our heads on straight, removes brain damage from all the mental math, and allows for repetition. It's one thing to get something right once, and an entirely other thing to need to repeat it over and over. Find a way to make your life simpler. Then, after executing, find another! Such a great way to approach this crazy life of ours.
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