Analyzing the level of service and cost trade-offs in cold chain transportation

This thesis discusses the tradeoff between transportation cost and the level of service in cold chain transportation. Its purpose is to find the relationship between transportation cost and the level of service in cold chain transportation. Regression models are built to quantify the additional cost of superior quality cold chain for both Chiquita and its carriers, and analyze the relationship between such cost and customer service level. In order to guarantee the freshness of salads and fruits, cold chain transportation has to meet strict quality standards and additional costs occur due to efforts required to maintain and monitor the transportation performance. The thesis takes quantitative approach to demonstrate the relationships among the quality standards required, the cost associated, and the customer service level reached. The temperature quality standards are mainly measured by monitoring data from RFID monitor Sensitech. The cost data are collected from Chiquita's historical carrier rates. The customer service level is measured in two dimensions, on time drop-off, and on time pick-up. The thesis also takes qualitative approach by a survey on carriers' additional cost of offering superior cold chain transportation among Chiquita's carriers. No correlation is found between transportation cost and the level of service in cold chain transportation. Therefore carriers with best cold chain management don't necessarily charge the highest.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Engineering Systems Division.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2009

Author dc:creator

• Liu, Saiqi

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Chris Caplice.

• Engineering Systems Division.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/53054

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/53054