bulk of the sales is generated from relatively few products in the product line. Pareto's law: 80 percent of a
firm's sales are generated by 20
PRODUCT CHARACTERISTICS
The most important characteristics of the product that influence logistics strategy are: weight, volume,
value, perishability, flammability, substitutability.
Products that are dense, that is, have a high weight-bulk ratio (e.g. printed materials, and canned foods), show
good utilisation of transportation equipment and storage facilities, with the costs of both tending to be low.
For products with low density (e.g., inflated beach balls, lamp shades), the bulk capacity of transportation
equipment is fully utilised before the weight-carrying limit is reached. Also, the handling and space costs tend
to be high relative to the product's sales price. As the product density increases, both storage and
transportation costs decline as a percentage of the sales price and price may also be reduced by lower storage
and transportation costs.