As summer nears its end, companies are taking stock of a campaign defined by operational pressure that repeats year after year. While organizations increasingly have increasingly precise tools to forecast demand, the real challenge remains the supply chain’s ability to respond during peak periods.
The situation unfolds in a particularly demanding operating environment. According to Randstad Research, absenteeism reached 7.2% of contracted hours in the first quarter of 2026, the highest level in five years. In activities such as logistics, peaks can approach 10% during high-intensity campaigns, coinciding with sales periods, holidays, and rising consumption.
The consequences are direct: delays in deliveries, stockouts, warehouses under greater operational pressure, and increased costs tied to incidents and urgent handling. A scenario that again highlights the difficulties many companies face in executing efficiently what they had already forecast.
“The real summer challenge hasn’t been demand, but ensuring that the entire operation is prepared to respond to it. An accurate forecast loses much of its value if the capacity required to execute it hasn’t been planned with the same lead time,” explains Arnau Peris, Country Manager for Slimstock Iberia.
Companies forecast better, but still struggle to execute
Digitization and the adoption of advanced planning tools have significantly improved companies’ ability to anticipate buying behavior and consumption patterns. However, summer has again shown that having information alone does not guarantee an efficient response.
When demand forecasting, inventory management, resource planning, and operating capacity evolve independently, the risks of stockouts, excess stock, or saturated operations increase. “The challenge isn’t just knowing what will happen, but ensuring that the entire supply chain is prepared to respond when it does,” notes Peris.
To meet this challenge, more and more companies are turning to integrated planning models that allow analyzing together the forecasted demand, inventory levels, lead times, and available operating capacity, with the aim of anticipating potential bottlenecks before they affect service.
A lesson that goes beyond the summer campaign
For Slimstock, one of the main takeaways from this summer is that the difference between a campaign managed successfully and one marked by operational incidents rarely depends on a single factor. Rather, it hinges on the ability to coordinate information, resources, and decisions under a single planning strategy.
«The question isn’t how much we are going to sell anymore, but whether we are prepared to respond to that scenario while maintaining efficiency and service levels», concludes Peris. «Forecasting demand matters, but true competitive advantage arises when the organization can turn that forecast into decisions that ensure availability, efficiency, and responsiveness».
