What is Cross-Docking?
Cross-docking is a critical logistics procedure that can greatly improve supply chain efficiency. In cross-docking, products from a supplier or manufacturing plant bypass the warehouse storage stage and are instead directly transferred to outbound transportation carriers, such as trucks destined for retail stores or customer locations.
The cross-docking approach essentially removes the inventory holding step from the supply chain flow. Instead of offloading inbound trailers or containers into a warehouse to await future customer orders, the received goods are prepared and immediately reloaded onto outbound trailers headed to customers. This cross-docking eliminates the dwell time traditionally associated with warehousing activities.
