Уч.пос. Кузякин А.С., Попова Т.Г. Английский язык для управления цепями поставок

operating strategy but being more effective that its competitors.

4.Most goods imported by Zara are produced by low-cost labour in non- T/F European countries.

5.Zara’s manufacturing capacities tend to be located close to distribution T/F centres in Galicia.

6. Zara developed successful manufacturing ideas which were later T/F adopted by its competitor Benetton.

7.Zara outsourced cost inefficient business activities to smaller sub- T/F contractors.

8.Labour-intensive activities are all done by low cost non-specialized T/F subcontractors.

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Ex. 3 Translate from Russian into English

1. Запасы постоянно меняются и обновляются, чтобы поддержать интерес покупателей-женщин

2. Товарный ассортимент Зары вызывает интерес у широкого круга женщин различных возрастов, ассоциируясь с новизной и исключительностью

3.Внутри самого предприятия выполняются только операции, использующие экономию, связанную с ростом масштаба производства

4.Субподрядчики работают в структуре компании-учредителя Зары – акционерной компании Inditex

5.Покраска, раскройка, маркировка и упаковка предметов одежды производится внутри фирмы-производителя

Ex. 4 Complete this chart about Zara's manufacturing activities.

Ex. 5 Match these words and phrases from the article (1-9) with their meanings

Ex. 6 Find words in the article that follow these nouns to form noun-noun partnerships.

1market

2manufacturing

3production

4inventory

5distribution

6design/manufacturing/delivery

Find three other noun-noun partnerships in Exercise 5 for talking about distribution.

Ex. 7 Use word partnerships from Exercise 6 to complete these sentences.

1.Throughout the ________ __________ there are regular inspections to make sure products meet the high standards.

2.Each shop receives new ________ _________ several times a week, based on its current sales and inventory levels.

3.For our European market, we use single _______ ________ ,which show all the different prices by country.

4.The high turnover of products and our efficient distribution mean that we are able to keep ______ _______ low.

5.Every week, one million items are distributed to the stores through our two regional ______ _______.

6.The ______ _______from warehouse to customer has been cut to three days by switching to air freight.

Ex. 8 Match each word from the article (1-7) with one which has a similar meaning (a-g).

Ex. 9 The writer uses the passive when describing Zara's operational processes. Complete these sentences, filling in the spaces with the verbs given in parentheses.

1.About 20 per cent of its merchandise ________________as finished goods...

(to import)

2.All other manufacturing activities _____________ small sub-contractors... (to

do)

Read the last two paragraphs again carefully and find at least four other examples of the passive.

Ex. 10 Complete these sentences using the passive form of the verbs in the box.

attach cut dye give source

1.Suppliers ____ _____ about two weeks to move from design to production of a new item.

2.Today, nearly 65 per cent of production ____ ______ in Europe.

3.Near Zara's distribution centre in La Coruna, fabric _____ _____ and _______

_______by robots in highly automated factories.

4.Security and price tags _____ ______to each item before shipping to the stores.

Ex. 11 Match the sentence halves to make sentences about Zara's activities and distribution.

Ex. 12 Listen to the dialogue “Types of Shopping Areas” and commentaries coming after it. Give English definitions to the words and expressions in bold print. Learn the dialogue by heart and dramatize it with another student in class.

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Sarah: Come on! We only have two more hours before the stores close and I want to make it to the outlet stores.

Aidan: I thought that when you asked if I wanted to spend the day together, you meant we’d go somewhere for lunch, go to a movie, or just hang out.

Sarah: Isn’t this much more fun? Shopping centers are like Disneyland!Aidan: This wasn’t exactly what I had in mind.

Sara: Just look. You have two shopping malls, retail stores, outlet stores, department stores, and specialty stores. What more could you want?

Aidan: That’s great for you, but what am I supposed to do?

Sarah: You can come with me, watch me try on clothes, and help me decide what to buy. Come on, I want to go to those stores in the strip mall over there.

Aidan: Why don’t I just find a place to get a snack and wait for you? I’m just dead weight when it comes to shopping.

Sarah: But I thought you wanted to spend the day together.

Aidan: I did, but I didn’t know I’d have to go to shopping hell to do it. (From ESL Podcast 941)

Ex. 13 Questions for discussion

1.In what ways are Zara's operating strategies different to those of its competitors, speaking in terms of sourcing, manufacturing, distribution and transportation, stock allocation and replenishment?

2.What are the potential risks for Zara of distributing products for all its global markets through its two distribution centres in the north-west of Spain?

3.How applicable are the principles of quick-response logistics to other sectors and industries?

Unit 15 Using FRID for managing stock

RFID - the price must be right

by John Blau

A shopper takes a bottle of shampoo from the supermarket shelf, and a signal from a state-of-the-art smart tag is sent to staff, updating them on stock levels. RFID - short for radio frequency identification, a technology that uses radio waves to

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automatically identify objects - is now working well and ready to replace conventional bar codes.

German retailer Metro AG, the world’s fifth-largest retailer, has been introducing RFID in stages along its supply chain since March 2004. So far, it has 25 distribution centres using the technology, mostly on the wooden pallets which carry the goods: more than 40 suppliers now attach RFID tags to their pallets. Recently, it has also started using tags on individual cases of products.

The ultimate aim is to use RFID at all levels, including the individual item, at all of its 2.300 locations - but that will not happen for years, according to Gerd Wolfram, Managing Director of MGI, Metro Group Information Technology.

‘We will see RFID increasingly replace bar codes for certain products, but the technology won’t be used to identify all products for at least 15 years,’ he says, giving high unit prices for the tags as one of the main reasons. Unit prices, Wolfram says, will need to drop to €0.01 per tag or less to make RFID a viable alternative to a bar code.

Metro sees RFID technology as a way to manage the huge flow of merchandise in and out of stores more effectively, while at the same time enabling the company to reduce inventory losses and labour costs. Wolfram says: ‘We firmly believe that we’ll be able to lower our operating costs with this technology and in time provide our customers with a better shopping experience.’

Since 2003, Metro has been testing RFID in a real retail situation at the Extra supermarket in Rheinberg, near Düsseldorf, as part of its Future Store Initiative. Among the innovative RFID applications that Metro is currently testing at the store is the ‘smart-shelf’, which automatically informs staff when to replenish merchandise. RFID tags are attached to packages of Gillette razor blades or plastic bottles of shampoo from Procter & Gamble. As customers pick up the tagged products, signals are sent electronically to the merchandise management system, which tracks the number in stock and sends out an alert to staff carrying PDAs (personal digital assistants) to tell them when shelves need restocking.

Metro is also carrying out development work on RFID at its RFID Innovation Centre in nearby Neuss, where it is testing more than 40 applications. The focus of most of these applications is logistics, warehousing and retail operations, but a few also involve consumers. For instance, they are developing a ‘smart fridge’ which identifies products and informs household members when expiry dates are coming up.

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At Neuss, Metro is also collaborating with around 20 technology partners, including key IT industry companies IBM, Intel and SAP to develop the technology further.

Ex. 1 Translate the article above using the vocabulary and comments

Ex. 2 Which of the following statements are true and which are false?

3.Suppliers of Metro AG attach RFID tags to each individual product T/F that passes through a supply chain.

4.Much water will flow under the bridge before overall RFID use T/F

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