Today was our last company visit here in Cyprus. We were fortunate enough to visit GAP Vassilopoulos Group, a company founded in 1964 by three brothers. One of them we were fortunate enough to meet today named Petros. The company began doing supply chain management but quickly expanded their industry to include a vast number of independent services ranging from logistics to financial, human resources, consumer, environmental, hospitality, airline, and many more different services. GAP operates in 10 different countries across Europe and its business and partnerships are It was really interesting to learn about their partnership with the German military, it’s an uncommon but very cool partnership to have and learning that they help to operate the military ships, food, and really everything logistically in Limassol port is such a unique partnership and I really found it interesting. Listening and seeing their timeline of all of their independent partnerships through the last 50 years really blew my mind. This company’s efficiency and sheer level of diversity in services offered is something I have very rarely seen in any business. Seeing this company’s determination and hunger for expansion and growth really opened my eyes and made me really respect GAP and all that they do.
Hearing from Petros and his nephew Andreas they provided us with plenty of knowledge and key supply chain concepts and ideas that I will take with me from this trip. The first thing they discussed was the idea of agility vs lean chains. Agile supply chains are ones that can adapt to any obstacles very quickly. Lean supply chains standardize which saves time in the long run. Lean supply chains also utilize economies of scale. GAP utilizes both of these strategies to not only save time but also save funds.the other supply chain concept they taught us about was transparency and visibility in markets. Strong supply chains can tell where a product is and when it will arrive. All of this information is really helpful and it was great to hear this information from experienced professionals was super key and valuable and I really enjoyed this company visit as it felt like a personal 1 on 1 conversation with higher ups which is something we haven’t necessarily got yet from any other company visit.
Thanks for always for reading
Will