The Basics of Quote-to-order Systems
P.J. Jakovljevic - November 9, 2007

It is not breaking news or an earth-shattering revelation that the days of mass production of commodity products (called “widgets”) are numbered for manufacturers and distributors that want to compete on value, and thus strive for higher profit margins. Certainly, the demand for some catalog-based items that are mass produced (in high-quantity production characterized by specialized equipment and labor) in a make-to-stock (MTS) fashion will never die out completely. However, those manufacturers will be forced to compete on price and on their supply chain effectiveness (particularly on delivery processes), with increasingly thinning margins...