Supply Chains
Where products come from before they reach the customer; raw materials, making, transporting, and selling; the journey of a product from start to finish
What a learner can do afterwards
- Trace the journey of a familiar product (e.g. chocolate bar) from raw material to shop shelf
- Identify at least three stages in a supply chain
- Explain why a long supply chain can make a product more expensive
The lesson
Before a chocolate bar reaches your hands, it travels through several stops. This path, from raw material to shop shelf, is called a supply chain. Almost everything you buy has followed a path like this.
Cocoa beans grow on trees on a farm. Workers pick the pods and dry the beans. A factory grinds the beans and mixes in sugar and milk to make chocolate. Trucks carry the finished bars to a warehouse, then to your local shop, where you buy one.
A short supply chain, with fewer stops, usually keeps a product cheaper. A long one, with farms, factories, and trucks in different places, usually costs more, because each stop needs to earn money too.
A supply chain is every stop a product makes, from raw material to shop shelf, and each extra stop can add to the price.
Watch it
Where it sits
Learn first
This opens up
Where this leads
Jobs that lean on this skill. Follow one to see everything it is built on.
8 questions wait behind this lesson, each with its answer explained. Every answer feeds the sky: stars light as they are learned, and dim when it is time to come back.