Brand awareness isn't just about product quality and saturation advertising. A smoothly functioning supply chain is a crucial element in winning customer loyalty.

Here's what the best companies are doing, in making sure they retain visibility over products and information in the chain. • Third in the Best Practices series.

In a perfect world, the tight coordination of systems and processes would allow goods to flow continuously from manufacturer to customer. With total understanding of consumer demand, who needs a lot of excess product taking up valuable real estate? • Second in the Best Practices series.

Relying in part on point-of-sale data, this software improves merchandise assortment, boosts total sales and helps increase average selling prices.

Point of sale is "where the facts are" that help retailers readjust orders to accommodate sales peaks and valleys that may be predictable but aren't always intuitive.

Ten best practices in supply-chain planning, culled from conversations with leading supply-chain executives, analysts and vendors - the first of a series of six "Best Practices" articles to be presented this year.