Logistics service provider (LSP) DHL Supply Chain is continuing to extend its investments in global multi-shoring and in reverse logistics, marking efforts to help its clients adjust to the challenging business and economic conditions of 2025.
One way it has done that is by growing its capability in handling product returns, after becoming what it calls the largest provider of reverse logistics solutions in North America in January through its acquisition of returns specialist Inmar Supply Chain Solutions.
The company’s focus on improving e-commerce parcel flows comes as a time when retailers are facing an array of delivery challenges—both international and domestic—triggered by a cascade of swift changes in reciprocal tariffs, “de minimis” import fees, and other protectionist escalations of trade war conditions imposed by the newly seated Trump Administration. While business groups are largely opposed to those policies, they still need strategies to accommodate those rules of the road as long as the new rules remain in place.
Accordingly, DHL last week released a new study on the growing importance of multi-shoring strategies that go beyond the classic “China Plus 1” philosophy and focuses on diversifying production and supplier locations even further, to multiple countries. This expanded “China Plus X” strategy can help companies build resilient supply chains by choosing more diverse production locations in response to global trade disruptions. The study offers five criteria for sourcing goods from countries outside China such as India, Vietnam, Hungary, and Mexico, depending on the procurement needs of each particular industry.
