Jake Barr (00:00):

Look, that’s the personification of what a supply chain leader is supposed to do, is supposed to actually listen to the intent of what the business is trying to accomplish and then design that experience around it. It isn’t just about finding the cheapest method to market, it’s called what characteristics must the supply chain be able to deliver in order to ensure we are satisfying our customer base?

Voiceover (00:27):

Welcome to Supply Chain Now, the number one voice of supply chain. Join us as we share critical news, key insights, and real supply chain leadership from across the globe. One conversation at a time.

Scott W. Luton (00:41):

Hey, good morning, good afternoon, good evening, wherever you may be. Scott Luton and Supply Chain Hall of Famer, Jake Barr with you here on Supply Chain Now. Hey Jake, how you doing today?

Jake Barr (00:51):

I’m doing great. I am so looking forward to this talk for 20 plus years. I have talked about how leveraging the supply chain can be a competitive weapon in how you delay your customers, and we’ve got a masterclass in it today and especially how to leverage ecosystem partners to help you deliver on that promise.

Scott W. Luton (01:14):

Oh, I love it. What a great way to open a show from the John Wayne of global supply chain. Stay tuned folks. On today’s show, we’re going to be featuring the intriguing story of an innovative and successful retailer, one who needed to find new supply chain partners to support the growth and success, especially a third party logistics provider. So today we’re going to walk through the whole story, the why behind the change the selection process, what to know and what to learn, the implementation of the partnership, and best part, perhaps the incredible outcomes that are being produced in a bright future ahead. So very practical lessons learned coming up for all of us, Jake, and what you’re calling a masterclass. Are we ready to go?

Jake Barr (01:54):

Absolutely. Let’s roll.

Scott W. Luton (01:55):

Alright, Jake, I’m going to introduce our esteemed panel here today, starting with Eri Iozdjan, CEO, with Maven Lane, his colleague Will Andrews, Executive Vice President with Maven Lane and Ronak Patel, Vice President Fulfillment Solutions and Data Analytics with Veyer Logistics. Hey, hey Eri. How you doing?

Eri Iozdjan (02:16):

Hey. Hey, I’m great Scott. Good to see you. How are you?

Scott W. Luton (02:19):

Wonderful. Great to see you as well. Will, hello?

Will Andrews (02:21):

Good morning. Good morning. Nice to be here. Thanks guys.

Scott W. Luton (02:25):

You bet. Look forward to hearing from you. And Ronak, how are you doing sir?

Ronak Patel (02:28):

Doing fantastic, sir. Appreciate you having us.

Scott W. Luton (02:31):

You bet. We’ve got a great story to get into. Jake, we’ve been looking forward to this one, huh?

Jake Barr (02:35):

We have, especially because we’ve got, I am not worthy a true innovator on the call.

Scott W. Luton (02:43):

Oh, love it, love it. Eri, Will and Ronak, let’s dive in. I’m going to start with a fun warmup question and we’re going to base this off something a little nugget about you area that I pulled from the great website over at Maven Lane. You are an accomplished culinarian, I think that’s the right word, who evidently has a delicious approach at making French onion soup. So I’d love to know from you, what’s one key aspect to making that famous dish?

Eri Iozdjan (03:10):

Alright, you had to bring up the French onion. There’s two right? Number one is thy just doing the onions themselves takes like 45 minutes.

Scott W. Luton (03:20):

Wow.

Eri Iozdjan (03:21):

I think part is love. You got to be patient, you got to look after it, you got to stir it and you got to care. So

Scott W. Luton (03:28):

Do

Eri Iozdjan (03:28):

A good French onion love and thy

Scott W. Luton (03:31):

Love and thm. And Amanda says she loves French onion soup, so we’ll see if we can’t.

Jake Barr (03:39):

I judge it by the top. I’m just saying I judge it by the top.

Scott W. Luton (03:44):

So true. Alright, I love that. That could probably be applied to many, many dishes. Alright, Will, on a similar note, what’s one dish that you or your family is well known for making?

Will Andrews (03:56):

Well, I don’t make a ton of the dishes in my house, so my wife is amazing at making all things what I get asked to make a lot. There’s two, it’s anything that has to do with on the grill, so that’s kind of what the family likes. Typically, burgers, steaks, nothing crazy, but it’s really just about how Eri was saying is you just have to watch it and pay attention to it. But the number one thing that my kids always asking me for is dad’s Rice Krispy treats. And the key here is you got to use a full stick of butter and that’s the key. And so you just do that. You also have to watch the temperature. You don’t want it to get too hard. My whole family is neurodivergent, so we’re big on texture and so texture matters the most and we want that soft, gooey just melting your mouth thing. So that’s what they’re usually asking dad for.

Scott W. Luton (04:48):

Oh well you had just had to go there. I’m salivating right now thinking about those Rice Krispy treats and all that butter.

Jake Barr (04:55):

I have to make. Okay. Can you give some of ’em to Ronak so he can expedite ‘em to my house this afternoon? I’m just saying.

Will Andrews (05:01):

Put an order in with him, he’ll get ’em there next day, I promise.

Scott W. Luton (05:04):

Oh, love it, love it. Alright Ronak, I’ll tell you after those two, you got a high bar, but what’s one dish that you or your family is known for making?

Ronak Patel (05:14):

I feel like Will and I always have vision lock. It’s very similar, not necessarily the greatest cook. My wife does an amazing job on that side, but I have been known for my ice cream creations. So I’d say the best one is probably the white chocolate Nutella and strawberries concoction that I make pretty good. And I think the key there is just don’t look at the calorie count, just enjoy.

Scott W. Luton (05:42):

Just enjoy it kind of splurge, right. Got a splurge really quick, Jake. We heard three outstanding culinary opinions and perspectives there. Which one are you most intrigued by?

Jake Barr (05:55):

Well Eri, because it shares a couple of common traits. Look, I’m a southern boy. I grew up in the south and so fundamentally southeastern conference rivalries reign. And so I take great enjoyment every year when I get to put together Gator Chile in honor of beating the University of Florida. And so as Eri knows time and love, if you’ve ever dealt with gator meat, it’s not tender. So you have to put a tremendous amount of time and effort and love into getting it to a tender state.

Scott W. Luton (06:35):

Okay.

Jake Barr (06:36):

Okay.

Scott W. Luton (06:36):

Alright, lots of food discussions here today, but we got to move on. We’ve got a great story here today that I think is going to inspire, as Jake said, some different thinking out there as we look to use and leverage supply chain for what it is, which is a massive competitive advantage. So let’s get into some level setting first. And Eri, I want to start with you, we’re going to dive more into the Maven Lane story in just a minute where customers are at the beginning of the journey and they’re North Star and I love that big factor of y’all’s culture and your DNA. But for starters, just share a little bit about yourself if you would, and what the organization does.

Eri Iozdjan (07:14):

Yeah, sure. Thanks Scott. A little bit about myself, I mean I’ve taken the furthest from the standard approach to where we are now at Maven Lane. I’ve had a variety of different roles and responsibilities, but I think the biggest one was working at Vitality, which I was the head of the marketing and sales channels and really learned how to take a company from quite literally our townhome garage to a full scale operation handful of years later. And we’ve been able to work with some awesome people and do the same thing over at Maven Lane in a entirely different vertical. So if anything, I’m trying to find the recipe and we’re getting closer.

Scott W. Luton (07:52):

Undoubtedly, and I look forward to learning a lot more about the incredible journey y’all been on over the next hour especially. I’m a big supply chain geek, so I’ll look forward to learning on that side. Alright, so Will, same thing just like Eri, I’d love to learn just a little bit more about yourself professionally.

Will Andrews (08:08):

Yeah, so first 13 years of my experience came from the United States Army. I was enlisted, started off as an enlisted soldier and then became a commissioned officer about six years into that. Deployed four different times, served on multiple different countries and deployments. Really learned firsthand the power of how you have to have a great supply chain in order to conduct good operations. Since then, worked in a variety of supply chain operational positions with a lot of pretty well known, I guess fulfillment partners and Chewy and Amazon and DHL and a few others as well. But here at Maven Lane I run operations and just a little bit about myself is don’t have a lot of interests or hobbies outside of my family, God and work. So it’s kind of what I do. I’m so excited to talk about all three here today.

Scott W. Luton (08:58):

Outstanding. I love that passion and I tell you, I speak for all of us here at Supply Chain Now, greatly appreciate and respect your service to our country and I look forward to getting some more stories with you on that journey maybe after today. Ronak, same question, if you would briefly tell us about yourself and what the team over at Veyer Logistics does.

Ronak Patel (09:16):

Yeah, absolutely. So my name is Ronak Patel. I’ve been in supply chain for the last 15 years, nine of those years at Amazon in a variety of different operational roles. And for those years at a venture-backed startup called Deko, servicing the small medium business world and helping entrepreneurs succeed there. Veyer Logistics, there’s plenty of definitions, but I love a definition that a potential client used when I toured a warehouse, they called us the largest well run three PL that no one has heard of. And I wasn’t sure if I should be complimented or offended by that, but it was super interesting. So we’ve got 40 plus warehouses, we’ve been doing this for 40 plus years, but Veyer itself has only been spun out in the recent years. So we’re a fairly new company, which is why people don’t know of us.

Scott W. Luton (10:00):

Well that is quite a compliment, even if it’s a unique compliment and Jake,

Jake Barr (10:05):

It’s spot on. They are the best kept secret in the supply chain space.

Scott W. Luton (10:11):

We’re going to really work hard to make that not be a secret anymore. And I’ll tell you stories like this, but leading with customers and the great growth stories, their innovative growth stories are having, that’s a great way to do it. So to our panel, we’ve got a great collection of leaders and all sorts of different experiences and expertise. So we’re going to dive in. Jake, really before I move on, we’ve got a very incredible collection of experience here and you’ve got a sneak peek of the story. Any prefacing comments on your end?

Jake Barr (10:41):

It’s an incredible story to tell because at the end of the day what you’re really looking for is how do I delight my customers? And fundamentally, if you design your experience from the outside back end, you’re going to win. And I think this is a great example of that.

Scott W. Luton (11:01):

Well said. So that’s a great segue, Eri, as we dive more into the Maven Lane story, the remarkable Maven Lane story, I want to start with the story behind the growing brand that puts the customers first. So two-part question, what inspired its creation and what was your more personal why?

Eri Iozdjan (11:20):

Well, they’re a bit intertwined. So I say the best that I can. What initially inspired its creation was a dream that I had. So one of our partners, he owns the supply chain side of the business and helps us maintain these factory direct relationships and everything in Vietnam. And he had raised the idea and interest over a long period of time. He was my neighbor. So kind of hard to escape when the guy’s coming over and giving you good ideas. And then eventually I went to sleep one night and I was thinking about, I thought the first thing we’re going to need if we’re going to do this because I already validated the concept, I done a competitive analysis, the vertical price points product, how can it actually work? And then once I decided, wow, I could really take a lot of the knowledge and things that I learned in the apparel space from a marketing and a brand perspective and apply that to a vertical that has a little bit lower of a barrier to entry because of the product type, just the industry itself and the standards.

Eri Iozdjan (12:18):

So I went to sleep one night and I won’t go into the whole dream, it’s long, but I had a dream about the name Maven Lane and what ended up happening is that it was knocking on this big wooden door, which is now our logo. I knocked, I knocked and I finally pushed it open and the light was so bright that it had shone on my face and I woke up and sat in my bed and I was trying not to freak my wife out. And then went about my morning and I called and I said, Hey, if we’re going to do this, it’s got to be Maven Lane because it just came to me. And that hasn’t happened to me very much in my life as I took it as a sign. We just got to work. Because conceptually what’s really important and the core of our mission and what we do is we are able to bring really high-quality designs and materials of product and furniture to our customer base at an accessible price point.

Eri Iozdjan (13:09):

Not because we’ve cheaped out on the process, not because we’ve found the cheapest goods or cheapest factories, but because we’ve streamlined it by way of supply chain. And now everybody can get a piece of that because if you think about all the spaces that we spend time as humans, we’ve got your work, sometimes it’s your home too, your car, and you’ve got your home. Well guess what? All those three things, you don’t change ‘em that often. In the influence of our space at work, it’s often very little. Maybe we can adjust our desk in the pictures that we have. Your car. Your car is your car. Maybe you can hang some rearview swag. But your home is where you really get to choose what you’re surrounded by and you’re surrounded by it all the time when you wake up, when you sit and have your coffee in the morning when you have friends and family over. And I thought it would be so cool to be able to open the doors for people to love their home and inspire more connection. That’s the root of why we do what we do.

Scott W. Luton (14:08):

First off, I want to learn more about this rearview swag. I think I’m missing out on that in the old car, but kidding aside, talk about a dream that’s really just inspired this incredible mission. That’s

Jake Barr (14:20):

Why I said, hey, I’m not worthy. Got a real true visionary that had an idea and has understood what it takes to win.

Scott W. Luton (14:29):

That’s right. And he is bringing your prefacing comments to fruition. Jake, you heard air right there. They’re not going to cheap suppliers, cheap resources. They’re just getting really smart and leveraging supply chain as a differentiator. It is.

Jake Barr (14:45):

Use the intelligence to build an effective supply chain will always win.

Scott W. Luton (14:50):

Alright folks, the juices are now going, we’ve talked food, we’re talking supply chain now with a fellow founder. Let’s shift over to the operation side. We’re going to bring in Will and Ronak into this in just a second. But Eri, let’s stick with you. We talked about the previous three PL partner. If you just put a little bit more definition around some of the challenges that you were having there.

Eri Iozdjan (15:11):

I’ve thought a lot about this over the last, anytime you’ve got change, you want to think about, hey, what worked, what changed, what variables still need to change? And I think the short of it is that needs change as a business develops. For example, in the early days it was me and two other people, well it’s pretty hard to manage a product portfolio of brand advertising, marketing, customer service and everything. So the partner that we leaned on was an all-in-one solution and unfortunately I don’t subscribe to being an AllOne solution for everything and doing it as well as say a group of specialists would, but you also have to understand the resources. I didn’t have the benefit of having a Will Andrews back in 2022. I think a lot of the challenges came from different business needs, but also just really tight attention to detail and care about the final delivery product because it’s one thing to get someone to trust you and buy your product, but it’s another thing to maintain a reputation to where someone’s excited that they bet on you as a new company. And I think that was a bit of a gap for us over time.

Jake Barr (16:14):

Love that area, especially just there’s an extra message in there. You’ve got the read between the lines. It isn’t just about a transactional one-time sale, it’s actually about building an experience that keeps people wanting to come back.

Scott W. Luton (16:31):

Yes, that is right. And Will he referenced you there as y’all continued to grow and he’s brought on all of your expertise, which is outstanding, what would you add about some of those challenges that he was speaking to with the previous partnership and what prompted the change? We’re going to walk through in a minute.

Will Andrews (16:48):

I think with what Eri’s vision is for the company, we needed a partner that was as customer-obsessed as we are. And that customer obsession, it’s really hard to do, especially in operations of large packaged goods, multiple warehouse settings. There’s just a lot of additional disciplines that you just have to have excellence as a routine and we just didn’t have that. And part of that, to unpack that just a little bit would be we had a 3% defective shipment rate. So if I sent out a hundred products and three of ‘em are messed up because of the shipping, you’re not going to win. And that goes back to what Jake was talking about on that experience because that experience, that means every hundred I sent out, I’m getting three bad reviews. That’s stuff you just can’t overcome in e-commerce. You just can’t. And then the response I think was probably the biggest frustration and challenge was, well we’re fast, we’re good, we’re doing everything the best we can.

Will Andrews (17:42):

And there really wasn’t any true root cause understanding or even just acknowledgement that that’s not acceptable or standard. My background was like, hey, I would be fired if this is what I produced, so we’re not going to this. So that was a challenge. And then on the customer service side, Eri and I have that fundamental belief of we’re going to take care of the customer if they took a chance on us, we’re going to make sure that they have a good reason to come back. But also just that the experience was positive, even if there’s stuff that happens, right? Because things happen, I can’t control carriers and weather issues and there’s things that happen. So it’s about how you respond and it’s really about the intent that you have. And so for us, we needed to have more control of that experience and that was, I would say, I think from Eri’s perspective, when he and I first chatted, I could quickly see that he wasn’t able to get what he wanted for the brand with the current partner. And so I quickly started to do some research for who else we could find.

Scott W. Luton (18:40):

And we’re going to get into that in just a second. Jake, you heard some great nuggets there from the damages 3%, goodness gracious, to the response times to the overall service levels and more your thoughts, Jake,

Jake Barr (18:52):

Well I want to give Will a salute because he deserves it on two fronts. First for his service, but equally important, look, that’s the personification of what a supply chain leader is supposed to do, is supposed to actually listen to the intent of what the business is trying to accomplish and then design that experience around it. It isn’t just about finding the cheapest method to market, it’s called what characteristics must the supply chain be able to deliver in order to ensure we are satisfying our customer base. And so a lot of people lose sight of that. They speak to it, but they really don’t act on it. And what you’ve heard Will clearly outline is no, no, no, we rolled up our sleeves, we went to work, we understood what were the characteristics we were going to have to win and then we started looking for it.

Scott W. Luton (19:51):

Excellent comments there Jake. Hey, Ronak it really quick. We’re about to move into selection just a second, but would you give us a quick comment there on what we heard from Eri and Will and maybe especially Will because of those very specific challenges there. Quick comment, you hear a lot of that as you’re meeting new potential customers out there.

Ronak Patel (20:09):

Yeah, absolutely. I think Will and Jake both nailed that, right, that the job of oh three PL should be saving the client time, money and headaches. Preferably all three, but at least two of the three. So that’s what we’re trying to do so they can focus on building their brand and growing their business.

Scott W. Luton (20:29):

Let’s eliminate all the Aleve or the Tylenol that they’ve got to take, right? BC powders, maybe let’s talk about the selection process. I think we’re going to get some nuggets here, some actionable nuggets, whether folks are going through a three PL selection process or many other things here. And Eri, I’ll circle back around to you. When it came to constructing this three PL selection process that obviously worked really well, what were some of the qualities that you really baked into it that you value you are looking for in a potential partner?

Eri Iozdjan (20:58):

I’d like to say something for any founder or sales and marketing focused individual that are running a company or growing it. First off, you don’t know what you don’t know. So if you’ve got a single partner and they tell you, Hey, here’s the best that we’re really going to get. A lot of times if you’ve got so many other things to deal with, you go, yeah, okay, cool, well I guess I’ll work with what I have. So get yourself a Will Andrews not Will Andrews because he’s amazing amazingly, but someone likely to help fill those knowledge gaps being you have to be real with yourself about hey, these are my areas of expertise, these are not. I will say going back to your question about what were some of the requirements, one like Will said, customer obsession, that’s really hard. It’s easy to say, but really hard to do because it’s expensive both in the focus department and sometimes financial department, but it will return. So getting a partner with that kind of mentality. Secondarily specific to us, furniture is not the easiest thing to ship. A lot of people have done big and bulky, some people have done it well, but a big and bulky bag of dog food is different than a cabinet that someone has paid between five and 500 and a thousand dollars for. So customer obsession and then actual finesse and ability to deliver somewhat delicate wood and good to end customer without any headache. Those are the big ones.

Scott W. Luton (22:20):

Big ones indeed. Jake, comment on that real quick.

Jake Barr (22:24):

I think underlying all of that, when you’re going through it and Eri was talking about it, how have you equipped yourself with the data and the understanding of how your current operation really is running? So I’m going to say a lot of people will have a lot of information but be data poor in terms of quality, the ability to understand and gain the insights about how their operation’s running Will was talking examples around, wait a minute, customer obsession. Well I can walk into an operation and I can tell whether or not they’re obsessed from a customer obsession standpoint by going and asking for a few nuggets of data. So we’ll talk about well what’s the damage and the return rate? Right. Okay. Walk me through one simple example of one execution and what do we do about it when it occurs? Simple things but the use of the data. And I want to give kudos to Ronak and his team because they’ve understood the criticality of the technology underlying how they run their operation and how it helps accomplish those three objectives that he mentioned.

Scott W. Luton (23:39):

Excellent. Call out Jake and Will. That’s a great segue. I want to get your input on how y’all constructed the selection process, what would not hit on.

Will Andrews (23:46):

Yeah, so Jake hit on a really big point. That was another gap we had was information and data. And really that comes down to connectivity with your information systems and you have to be connected to your operational arm and that data is what will then feed demand planning. It tells your customer bases where your customers are. It tells you a lot of things. That was a big thing for me is I needed a player that really from the two perspectives I’m looking for to make it simple was do they know what they’re doing? Can I trust them? I would say can I trust them? Plays a lot more to me than do they know what they’re doing? Because the three people we have on the call, we are all believers that we know how to help improve processes. If people have those two things, we can trust them and they know what they’re doing.

Will Andrews (24:34):

So that was a key piece for us in the selection process and knowing what you’re doing to what Eri was chatting about of the big and bulky space is it’s more than lib service because you have to have a wide network of warehouse space, but then also really good operational, just leadership so that you have associates that care for your product. That is the difference, at least that I know that I’ve seen with Veyer. We will get into a little bit more when we walk their warehouses, but that’s the only way you get customer obsession is if there’s leadership inside those warehouses that make the associates that are touching your product care about what they’re doing. And the only way that you can do that, having run multiple warehouses myself, is you have to show that you care about them and that requires servant leadership and that goes back to picking somebody that you can trust.

Scott W. Luton (25:23):

Alright, Jake, from the information to the trust, to the operational leadership to the customer obsession, you hear there,

Jake Barr (25:30):

Look, winning is all about creating a culture of winning. And so fundamentally the way you think about an ecosystem of tying, I’m trusting, I’m entrusting my customer with you.

Jake Barr (25:44):

I’ve got to have an understanding that the cultures of the companies that we’re putting together here are a fit. It’s not just a transactional execution. I’ve got to have somebody that actually manages their operations trains and develops their people to care. They’re wearing the Maven Lane patch that is critter.

Will Andrews (26:07):

I’m with you. And that reminds me of a story. I think it’s a great time to tell it is when Eri and I were getting ready to go visit there, we’d gone through some of the selection process. At this point we’re in negotiation and we want to see their operations. And Eri, he asked me, he’s like, Will, alright, what are some key things we’re looking for here? And for me, I come from a lean background, so I’m saying I told him there’s a few things we want to look at. The number one thing we’re going to look at is the parking lot and we’re going to go and we’re going to drive around and we’re going to look at the trucks. We’re going to go look at all of the back of where the docks are because cleanliness is a sign of discipline and discipline is a sign of people that care.

Will Andrews (26:46):

I said then the second thing we’re going to do is that we’re going to look for associates and if they talk to us, because that’s where you can see leadership. And again, going back to the two things that I really focused on here and instantaneously you walk in the place was immaculate. I think we had six or seven associates. They were the ones leading the tour. It wasn’t the executives, which that’s another thing you look for. Is it executives leading the tour? Is it the leaders and really the operators? And then I get nerdy and so then I want to talk the WMS system and just really see how people react to being engaged with, and that’s just something that stood out just so it was a breath of fresh air for me because one, they have metrics of 99.999% and then there’s like 19 different dcs that are fighting for that one spot and they do it every day and I’m like, okay, cool.

Will Andrews (27:37):

So they’re dedicated to measurement and the associates knew about it and then you’re walking the floor and you see people and they say hi. And that’s just important, as simple as it sounds, is if your operators won’t talk to you, I don’t think they care that much. They’re just trying to get through their day. So that was awesome. And then one of the other, we did another visit and I think we had an associate, Ronak, I think he had 42 years at the org. Wow. You don’t have that type of tenure if you’re not taking care of your people in the warehouse space because it’s a tough job, it’s a challenging environment, it’s a lot of physical work. So those are just two things that really stood out for me with

Scott W. Luton (28:17):

Bayer and Will, if you recall that person’s name at 42 years of experience, let us know. But Ronak, before we talk selection process, just respond to what Will just shared there. That’s big. Yeah, I

Ronak Patel (28:30):

Truly appreciate all the kind words. It’s a big shout out to the operational teams. It’s not necessarily my team, but the bigger team has been doing this for 40 plus years Will said a lot of these associates have been here for 20, 30 years. I think the average tenure in most buildings is 10 years. These employees are really, really passionate about what they do and dedicated to servicing the customers. So really, really appreciate all the kind words Will, it’s a big shout out to the ops team and how they execute and we’ll nailed it, right? It’s a culture thing. So the culture’s great, they can focus on safety quality.

Jake Barr (29:04):

Well also triggered another piece that I think it’s important to talk here guys. You can walk into three PL operations that have tenured employees, et cetera, right? But what’s also different here is the level of information integration and technology integration around how they assist the employees to actually execute the work and fulfill the expectations. And I would submit to you what Will was talking about earlier, look, when you actually invest in your operations, in your people and you constantly are on a zero loss journey where you are constantly helping and assisting them in eliminating the source of the most recent defects and loss, it becomes a self-fulfilling culture because they themselves take control of it and are constantly looking for how do we eliminate, yeah, I know we had that one thing happen, but how do we eliminate it from happening again? That is magic.

Scott W. Luton (30:07):

Well said. Ronak, let’s get back. I’d love to get your thoughts on the selection process. Anything else that maybe was important from your perspective, what you observed or were part of and then give us your advice for others that are going through their own new three PL selection processes.

Ronak Patel (30:24):

My advice has always been start early. If you think you need to start by a date, add two more months to that date and start that visit the warehouses. Try to go unexpectedly like hey, I can only make tomorrow work. So like Will said, cut out the executives try to go and actually see what the conditions of the warehouse look like when they’re not planning for it. So anyone can plan for a site tour and pretty up the warehouse. We like to be tour ready any day. It’s just part of what we do. So go there, try to go unexpectedly, try to spend time with the actual people that are going to be touching your products and taking care of your products. The leadership team on site, the warehouse on site, people like me that fly out, tell ‘em to get out of the way and you want to talk to the people in the building. The other piece I touch on is actually kind of leverage the supply chain nerds. We are nerds. If you’re in supply chain, you are a nerd, whether you like it or not, leverage them. Build that relationship. If you start early in advance, you’re going to be able to build that relationship to be able to leverage the three pl, be able to say, Hey, these are my problems. How do you go about solving,

Jake Barr (31:30):

Oh right, I’m sorry to interject, but you take nerdism to another level. That’s what I love about you guys is fundamentally you are constantly on a learning journey for how can we up our game another level from a tech standpoint and it truly stands out

Will Andrews (31:50):

And we got some real fun things to talk about later of what Veyer is going to be able to provide more brands like us with their technology stack. So I definitely want to make sure we cover that.

Scott W. Luton (32:01):

Oh Will. We’re about to dive in. We are about to dive in terms of impact. So Will to your point and Eri, Eri, I’m going to actually circle back around to you as we start to talk about how the partnership here between Maven Lane and Veyer logistics, how it’s truly impacted business operations. We’re going to answer the so what crowd out there? So Eri, tell us about the impact,

Eri Iozdjan (32:23):

Biggest impact, single word control. You cannot influence or impact many things that you can’t control. That’s simple on the bath of control data. If you’re running a disciplined and organized business, there’s no way in heck that you’re going to make the progress achieve your wildest big thematic goals if you can’t dive into the correct KPIs week over week, over week over week. And that’s the biggest thing, control, because my mentality is I’m okay if we are not, we want to be in certain areas. I’m not okay if we don’t have visibility in order to create action plans and hit our goals. So that’s the key is having visibility able to make those corrective actions and hit those goals. And that’s what we’ve been able to get through the data suite that Bayer has been working with us on.

Scott W. Luton (33:16):

Well said. And Jake, really quick before I move around to Will, bringing things outside of our control into our control, which allows our teams to really impact that customer experience you were talking about earlier, that’s big advice from area there, huh?

Jake Barr (33:30):

Oh, it’s huge because look, when you’re able to light up where the issues are, right, that by default says I can set a plan to make sure I can take corrective action. It also says if I can actually identify it, then I can figure out the root cause of it. If I can figure out the root cause of it, then I can put corrective action so that it may be because we just changed something we added to the portfolio and it’s created new nuances. Well hey, if that’s being only known by one person who’s out on a shipping dock trying to move the material, that’s a problem, right? Because area’s off dreaming up another 50 items that he may be bringing into the portfolio that’s going to amplify the issue. So I always say making it visible and being able to go through the root causing of it is where you win.

Will Andrews (34:22):

Yeah, that’s how you get to problem solving instead of solution stuffing.

Scott W. Luton (34:26):

That’s right. And of those 50 new products that area may be envisioning, there might be some bestsellers like this. I’ve got my eye on this. 26 inch Pullman counter steel. It’s got this beautiful dark walnut finish area and will

Will Andrews (34:39):

Bestseller.

Scott W. Luton (34:40):

Oh man, I’ll give us a call, get it to you tomorrow. Let’s do it. Oh I love it. Alright, Will, let’s stick with you. We’re talking impact of the partnerships. So tell us what else would you add to this?

Will Andrews (34:50):

I don’t know that I could truly put it into just a few words, but truly impactful is an understatement. We developed an API connection, so we had that data to be able to see, just to be able to see my order file for the first time as the guy in charge of operations was. So just a breath of fresh air and then a defect rate. I definitely don’t have a 3% defect rate anymore. Well under 0.005 of a percent. It’s so small it’s almost not even worth talking about and it’s usually on a carrier and people that are in supply chain know that sometimes those happen. And the thing I love about what Veyer does is they take every single one serious. I have an amazing account manager and Rob and I just can reach out to him and he’s usually already on it knowing about it sometimes before I do.

Will Andrews (44:18):

Outstanding. They definitely will reach out fast. That’s something I do want to highlight our selection process and I come from a three PL background where I ran warehouses and usually when you’re looking at doing customized, not cookie cutter, just one or two SKUs, this is all we’re going to do. It usually takes you months. We did it in less than a month with Veyer and so that’s just a kudos to the rate and the speed at which would they work and how much investment that they’re putting into making sure that they can bring others on fast.

Scott W. Luton (44:50):

Thank you Will for that. And Jake, we were talking just on a couple of shows this week about the importance of trusted accelerants in the business and that can occur at all stages of the relationship, right?

Jake Barr (45:01):

It absolutely can. But what you’ve got here again is a masterclass because fundamentally guys, the most important piece that we’ve talked about the entire session is it’s one team, one dream. These aren’t two different teams. That’s the takeaway, the critical takeaway for you. Now, if you do this right, your ecosystem is seamless.

Scott W. Luton (45:24):

You’re reading my mind, Jake, you’re reading, your crystal ball is working extremely well as always and that’s where I was going to get from it. But you’ve already identified it seamless. It’s tough to see where one organization starts, another one begins, we’re all on the same team. That’s an excellent, excellent key takeaway here today. I want to go back for a second. Ronak mentioned their website. We’ve got that. I think we also have a link for a specific landing page for getting started today. And you can also connect with Ronak again to get started, start the conversation. And as Will says, they don’t waste any time the rubber meets the road. Very quickly, let’s make sure we’ve identified how folks can connect with Ronak Patel with Veyer Logistics. Eri. If folks want to compare notes, if they want to get some of that gorgeous, gorgeous furniture or if they want to learn more about the story here today, how can folks connect with you?

Eri Iozdjan (46:16):

Yeah, it’s you want to just check out the story and the products and the site. It’s www.mavenlane.com if you want to chop it up, compare notes personally you can find me on LinkedIn, Eri Iozdjan, I don’t know if there’s a lot of people with my name so it shouldn’t be too difficult. Those are the two ways.

Scott W. Luton (46:35):

It’s just that easy. It’s just that easy. And folks, if you don’t want to place big orders, don’t venture over to mavenlane.com because they got some good looking stuff. I’m going to hide it from Amanda. I’m going to hide it from Amanda. Kidding aside though. Alright, Will, same question. How can folks connect with you, my friend?

Will Andrews (46:52):

So you could go to mavenlane.com and hit contact us. That’s one way or will@mavenlane.com. I’m a unique individual who doesn’t do social media.

Scott W. Luton (47:02):

Hey, that’s good. We need all those individuals, especially those that don’t get distracted by all the reindeer games going on on social media. But Will really have appreciated your perspective and of course area your perspective and y’all story, what you’re building. I mean we promised, Jake promised, not me, but Jake promised a masterclass and I’ll tell you our panel has delivered, huh?

Jake Barr (47:25):

Absolutely.

Scott W. Luton (47:26):

Alright, a couple of quick things before we wrap. What an outstanding session here today. We also, as promised you can get started, there’s a specific link to get started with Veyer Logistics today. One quick link and I’m telling you, zero to 60 in no time. No time. So folks want to thank a lot of incredible, an incredible panel, incredible story here today, Eri Iozdjan, CEO of Maven Lane. Eri tried to trip me up, I think I powered through it, but outstanding story here today. Thanks so much, Eri.

Eri Iozdjan (48:01):

Thank you for having us. It meant the world. We appreciate it. You

Scott W. Luton (48:04):

Bet. Will Andrews really again appreciate your service and we say oftentimes folks that serve the country wear the uniform after their time there. They keep on serving, doing big things out in the industry. And you are a living testimony to that, my friend. Thanks for being here, Will,

Will Andrews (48:21):

Thanks for having me. Appreciate letting us tell our story.

Scott W. Luton (48:24):

You bet. Ronak Patel, man, I would be ready to run through that wall behind you after hearing from Will and Eri, thanks for making time as busy as y’all are. Ronak, I hope to see you soon my friend.

Ronak Patel (48:36):

Absolutely appreciate all the kind words.

Scott W. Luton (48:37):

You bet. And Jake Barr, always a pleasure to have these conversations. This one’s, I wish it was Monday. Now that would mean we got a lot more of these stories, but what a great show to finish this week going, huh Jake,

Jake Barr (48:48):

Great way to top off the end of the week. And quite frankly, Eri, you’ve got a rocket ship on your hands. I’m so looking forward to what you do with the next couple of releases. And I also want to challenge you and Will to put yourselves in consideration for the Gartner top 25 supply chains because you have a model operation you’re building.

Eri Iozdjan (49:11):

Thanks so much, Jake. I’d love to look into that. I’d love to look into that. Maybe we can pick your brain. Yeah,

Will Andrews (49:15):

Yeah. Okay. We need to pick your brain more, Jake.

Scott W. Luton (49:20):

Well, hey, be careful. What you find, I’ll tell you Jake, is a

Jake Barr (49:25):

White hair comes not only with age, but with battle scars. There

Scott W. Luton (49:28):

You go. That’s right. Well, we need it all.

Will Andrews (49:30):

I’m losing mine, so I’m with you.

Scott W. Luton (49:33):

Hey, you never know how shows are going to finish around here, but folks, hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I have. What an outstanding panel, outstanding story with lots of actionable takeaways. And that’s where your homework comes in. You got to take one thing you heard from Eri. Will Ronak and Jake one thing, share it with your team. Put it into practice D’s, not words. That’s how we transform this wonderful industry that we’re all in. And on that note, on behalf of the entire team here at Supply Chain now, Scott Luton challenge you to do good, give forward, be the change that’s needed, and we’ll see you next time. Right back here on Supply Chain now. Thanks everybody.

Voiceover (50:09):

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