Evaluating the comparative managerial efficiency of leading third party logistics providers in North America

Purpose – This paper aims to measure the comparative managerial efficiency of 24 leading third‐party logistics providers (3PLs) in North America and identify best‐practice firms among these 3PLs.Design/methodology/approach – This paper proposes data envelopment analysis to measure the slack‐based efficiency, pure technical efficiency, and mixed efficiency of 24 leading 3PLs in North America, relative to their rivals in world‐wide 3PL markets. In particular, this paper develops both the Charnes, Cooper and Rhodes (CCR) model under constant returns to scale and the Banker, Charnes, and Cooper (BCC) model under varying returns to scale that are designed to derive weights without being fixed in advance.Findings – With respect to managerial efficiency, this study did not find any significant performance differences between asset based 3PLs and non‐asset based 3PLs. Defying the common sense, relatively small but niche‐oriented 3PLs with limited service offerings tended to perform better than their larger counte...

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