Supply Chain 101: Back to Basics

Join us for a foundational overview of publishing supply chains and post-pandemic trends.

The book publishing supply chain has changed dramatically over the past two decades—and even more so since the pandemic. Shifts in formats, business models, and market expectations have reshaped how content is created, manufactured, distributed, and sold, adding new layers of complexity to an already challenging system.

In this January Supply Chain Lunch & Learn, BISG welcomes LORA CECERE, Founder of Supply Chain Insights, and a leading voice in global supply chain strategy, for a back-to-basics conversation grounded in today’s realities.

Lora will provide a foundational overview of the publishing supply chain, framed around the core concepts of source, make, and deliver, and explore how industry dynamics have evolved in a post-pandemic environment. Drawing on her extensive research across industries, she’ll discuss topics such as:

• How publishing supply chains differ from other industries due to high SKU counts, returns, and demand uncertainty
• The long-term impact of digital formats and e-commerce on supply chain structure
• Why forecasting remains so difficult—and how attribute-based, data-driven models can improve demand sensing
• The “bullwhip effect” and the challenges of data sharing between publishers, distributors, and retailers

The session will include a brief presentation followed by a moderated, interactive discussion, giving participants an opportunity to ask questions, share experiences, and compare perspectives across the publishing ecosystem.

FEATURED SPEAKER

LORA CECERE is the Founder of Supply Chain Insights and the author of the widely read enterprise software blog, Supply Chain Shaman, with over 325,000 readers from the supply chain community. She contributes as a LinkedIn Influencer and a Forbes writer. Lora has penned eleven books on supply chain management, including Bricks Matter (2012) and Metrics that Matter (2014). She holds a BS in Chemical Engineering from the University of Tennessee and an MBA from the Wharton School of Business. In her free time, Lora enjoys gardening, quilting, and working on her next book.

About the Supply Chain Lunch & Learn Series

BISG's Supply Chain Lunch & Learns are always highly interactive, so you'll have a chance to contribute at the session. If you have any specific questions you'd like us to cover in this Lunch & Learn, you may send them in advance to info@bisg.org or simply add them to the chat during the session.

To allow participants to speak—and not just type questions—these sessions are conducted in a Zoom meeting (rather than webinar) format. Please take a moment to ensure that your microphone is muted until you'd like to contribute. While we encourage you to attend the live session, the conversation will be recorded and shared with registrants after the session takes place.