Collaborative planning forecasting replenishment schemes in apparel supply chain systems: Cases and research opportunities

Fashion apparel industry is dynamic, and is highly affected by the ever-changing market trend and consumer needs. With the constant change of consumers’ preferences, concepts such as fast fashion arise and become more and more dominant. Many of these concepts are made feasible only with a highly efficient and responsive supply chain. In this paper, collaborative planning, forecasting and replenishment (CPFR) schemes and various inventory management practices in apparel supply chains are explored. We first focus on studying an individual case on a garment manufacturer.We then investigate the American denim supply chain and reveal various inventory management practices and the role played by CPFR. Some future research directions are discussed.