Insights · field notes

Field notes on planning, simulation, and decision support.

Short, opinionated pieces on what's actually working in D2C and hyperlocal operations, and where the spreadsheet ends and the twin begins.

Let Your Business Team Plan Your Operations
Article May 19, 2026

Let Your Business Team Plan Your Operations

Your optimization model has hundreds of thousands of variables but needs only a few thousand. When operations teams describe their own problem in their own language, the model gets 50x simpler and they can run it themselves.

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Seven Recurring Decisions Where Optimization Pays Back This Quarter
Article May 12, 2026

Seven Recurring Decisions Where Optimization Pays Back This Quarter

Operations strategy works better as a portfolio of recurring decisions than as a one-time philosophical debate. Seven decisions where optimization pays back this quarter for D2C and hyperlocal operators, and the supporting capabilities that turn them into a system.

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Build, Buy, or Configure? Rethinking the Planning-Stack Decision for D2C and Hyperlocal Operations Leaders
Article May 1, 2026

Build, Buy, or Configure? Rethinking the Planning-Stack Decision for D2C and Hyperlocal Operations Leaders

The build-buy debate is incomplete. A fourth option, configure on a planning platform, has changed the math for the mid-market.

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How to Pilot Optimization in Hyperlocal Delivery and D2C Operations Without Creating Operational Risk
Article April 22, 2026

How to Pilot Optimization in Hyperlocal Delivery and D2C Operations Without Creating Operational Risk

Most optimization pilots fail because they're designed like demos rather than live operations. A practical playbook for piloting safely.

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What Comes After Real-Time Visibility: Optimization-Backed Decisions
Article April 15, 2026

What Comes After Real-Time Visibility: Optimization-Backed Decisions

Real-time visibility was the differentiator of the last decade. The lever that matters now is translating visibility into decisions.

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Why D2C and Hyperlocal Operations Still Run on Spreadsheets
Article April 8, 2026

Why D2C and Hyperlocal Operations Still Run on Spreadsheets

Roughly 73% of D2C and hyperlocal operators describe their planning stack as legacy systems, ERPs, and ubiquitous spreadsheets.

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