University of Arkansas, Fayetteville ScholarWorks@UARK Wal-Mart Sustainability Case Project Supply Chain Management 5-31-2013 Bottled aW ter Logistics and Forecasting Michael Galbreth University of South Carolina Matthew A. Waller University of Arkansas, Fayetteville Christopher Vincent University of Arkansas, Fayetteville David G. Hyatt University of Arkansas, Fayetteville Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarworks.uark.edu/scmtwscp Part of the Business Administration, Management, and Operations Commons, and the Sustainability Commons Recommended Citation Galbreth, Michael; Waller, Matthew A.; Vincent, Christopher; and Hyatt, David G., "Bottled Water Logistics and Forecasting" (2013). Wal-Mart Sustainability Case Project. 4. http://scholarworks.uark.edu/scmtwscp/4 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Supply Chain Management at ScholarWorks@UARK. It has been accepted for inclusion in Wal-Mart Sustainability Case Project by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks@UARK. For more information, please contact
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[email protected]. The Walmart Sustainability Case Project Date: 05/31/2013 Walmart’s Sustainability Journey: Bottled Water Logistics and Forecasting Eric Smith, regional supply chain manager for Walmart, walked down a concrete aisle between towering shelves of products and pallets. It was a hot day in July 2010, and Smith had made the trip to the backroom of a Conway, Arkansas, Walmart Supercenter to think about water—bottled water, to be specific. The inventory levels had been piling up at an alarming rate at the regional distribution center (DC) in Clarksville, Arkansas, apparently as a result of some overly optimistic forecasting of demand over the July 4 holiday. Smith soon found what he was looking for: a vast section of storage shelves densely packed with pallets of bottled water, ranging from single- serve, 10-ounce bottles to 2.5-gallon jugs.