On the same note, reconditioning returns a product functionally to almost same as new product condition but unlike remanufacturing, it might not necessarily provide warranty and the process might not include disassembly and cleaning of all parts of the products (Charter and Gray, 2008). Moreover, it can be said that remanufacturing is a process, a set of linked activities, rather than a single step aimed at restoring the performance of a product however repair or reuse are simply defined as an activity (Gallo et al., 2012).
2.2.2. Remanufacturing process: A decision perspective The processes of remanufacturing and reverse logistics activities can be classified into collection, disassembly, inspection, sorting, cleaning, reprocessing, reassembly, checking, testing and redistribution (Charter and Gray, 2008; Sundin, 2004; Wen-hui et al., 2011). Although the market for remanufactured products seems promising, there is huge uncertainty in the entire remanufacturing reverse supply chain in terms of quantities and timing of returns, recovery time, cost, products quality and market demand (Ferguson, 2009). As a consequence, there is a lack of control over remanufacturing reverse supply chain and remanufacturers are faced with difficulties in decisionmaking and planning of production, inventory, demand, organizational model and network design (Gallo et al., 2012). Such lack of fixed product and process criteria for remanufacturing leads to development of rules of thumb-based heuristic model by some firms. To give an example, strategic decisions such as remanufactured products’ price range, markets and distribution channels where they can be sold, are largely dependent upon the rules of thumb, which may otherwise increase the risk of product cannibalization (Ferguson, 2009). The price of remanufactured products has to be certain percentage lesser than the price of new products in the market (Valenta, 2004). If the products have more than 50% of the market share then it is not appropriate for remanufacturing since there is a higher possibility of cannibalization of the firm’s new products (Ferguson, 2009). Yet another example is the disassembly stage which has a direct impact on the final product’s quality and has a fixed point in upstream of the entire process. This part of remanufacturing process is highly time demanding and labor-intensive, and is also subjected to higher human error (Gallo et al., 2012). This makes disassembly a highly uncertain in terms of level, sequence and method for optimum disassembly (Mok et al., 1997; Priyono et al., 2013) – thus decision regarding these aspects being largely subjected to bounded rationality of the remanufacturers. Also note that the sequence of activities such as inspection, cleaning or testing that determines the quality standard of the remanufactured process and product depends upon the characteristics of the product, level of cleaning required, and the technology available for treatment – and in many cases is dependent on the remanufacturer’s skills and experience. Over time, this demands a standardized quality inspection system. These suggest that heuristic-based decision-making perspective plays a vital role in the remanufacturing process. A concise model of key factors required for assessing the feasibility of remanufacturing is proposed in Goodall et al. (2014). Such decision making is required at all levels: strategic, tactical and operational, and impacts triple-bottom line sustainability. Economically, it is important to create higher remanufacturing value for the product and for the business, and at the same time ensure lower process costs. A large number of factors, related to product design, quality and process efficiency affects the cost. The environmental impacts of remanufacturing are related to prolonging the product lifetime; whilst environmental directives and legislations provide different incentives to many industrial sectors to conduct remanufacturing activities. Finally the social benefits of remanufacturing can be evaluated to be related to both human and societal aspects, that concerns additional job creation, improving skillsets in particular industry sectors, etc.
feasibility of fashion remanufacturing
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