Last updated: July 13, 2026
Supply Chain Staffing
A lot of resumes say “supply chain.” Some mean one procurement internship. Some mean twelve years running S&OP for a national manufacturer through two ERP migrations and a tariff shock. We place the second kind. Planners, buyers, logistics and operations leaders vetted by recruiters who have staffed the industrial workforce since 2005.
Supply chain touches every part of an operation, so it sits alongside our light industrial and warehouse staffing and manufacturing staffing teams. When a search needs the systems layer, our supply chain IT staffing group covers the SAP, Kinaxis, and Manhattan work that keeps the plan running.
KORE1 is a supply chain staffing agency that places demand planners, buyers, logistics managers, and operations leaders across the United States, with a 17-day average time-to-hire and a 92% 12-month retention rate.
The Whipsaw Never Really Ended.
Demand snapped one way, then the other, and the planning team was the shock absorber for all of it. First it was empty shelves and blank order books. Then a flood of inventory nobody could sell. Then tariffs, a nearshoring push, port math that changed every quarter, and a board that suddenly wanted a resilient supply chain by Friday. The people who can actually steer through that are rare, and every manufacturer, distributor, and 3PL in the country is chasing the same short list.
That is where the wrong hire quietly costs a fortune. A buyer who has only ever cut POs against a stable plan is not the person you want negotiating allocation during a shortage. We screen for the difference, because we have placed operations and industrial talent since long before “supply chain resilience” was a line item, and our recruiters can hear it fast when a candidate ran a real S&OP cycle versus sat in the room while someone else did. Demand for the planning, procurement, and logistics layer keeps climbing as companies rebuild their networks for resilience rather than pure cost.
Request Supply Chain Talent →“Employment of logisticians is projected to grow faster than the average for all occupations, as firms look to move products more efficiently and control costs across increasingly complex supply chains.”
— U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Outlook Handbook
Flexible Ways to Staff a Supply Chain.
Some teams need a planner for a peak season or an ERP cutover. Some need a permanent director of supply chain who will own the network strategy for the next decade. We support every model, and we will tell you up front when the one you asked for is the wrong fit for the work.
Contract
Drop-in coverage for a defined push. Peak season, an S&OP backlog, or a planner on leave. Fast onboarding, no long commitment.
Contract-to-Hire
Run the person against your real plan and your real ERP for 90 days before converting. Useful when the role is new and scope is still moving.
Direct Hire
Permanent seat for a manager or director who will set the planning process, own supplier strategy, and build the bench under them.
Project Teams
Scoped engagement. A network redesign, a distribution center stand-up, or a procurement transformation staffed against a hard deadline.
Supply Chain Roles We Place.
“Supply chain” is thirty jobs wearing one title. The demand planner who lives in the forecast. The commodity buyer who negotiates through an allocation. The transportation manager who reroutes a network when a port jams. The distribution center manager who runs a building of 400 people at 2 a.m. during peak. Same function on the org chart. Wildly different people. We screen for the lane, not the buzzword.
Roles we have placed
- Demand and Supply Planners (Kinaxis, Blue Yonder, o9, statistical forecasting)
- S&OP and SIOP Managers (cross-functional planning, executive cadence)
- Buyers, Procurement and Category Managers (sourcing, negotiation, supplier risk)
- Materials and Inventory Managers (MRP, DRP, safety stock, cycle counting)
- Logistics and Transportation Managers (TMS, carrier management, freight)
- Import / Export and Trade Compliance Specialists (HTS, customs, ITAR)
- Distribution Center and Warehouse Operations Leaders (WMS, labor management)
- Industrial Engineers and Continuous Improvement Leads (Lean, Six Sigma)
- Supplier and Quality Engineers (PPAP, APQP, supplier audits)
- Directors and VPs of Supply Chain, Procurement, and Operations
The tools come up fast on these calls, and the names matter. A planner who ran Kinaxis RapidResponse is not automatically fluent in Blue Yonder or SAP IBP, and that gap shows up in week two. Procurement people live in Coupa, Ariba, and SAP; the DC leaders live in Manhattan and Blue Yonder WMS. Certifications tell you something too. ASCM’s CPIM and CSCP, a CPSM on the sourcing side, a Green or Black Belt for the improvement roles. We check for the real thing, not the acronym on the resume. For the broader occupational picture, the BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook tracks the purchasing and planning categories these roles map to.
How We Hire Supply Chain Talent That Sticks.
Scope the role honestly
We get on a call and pin down the real work. Planning or sourcing or logistics. The ERP and planning stack you run. The network you operate, the volatility you live with, and what “good” looks like on day 90. Titles hide more than they reveal, so we get past them fast.
Source and technically vet
Our recruiters know what a real planning or procurement track record looks like. We dig into actual numbers moved, the systems they used, and the disruption stories nobody puts on a resume. The shortlist usually lands inside two weeks. Sometimes sooner.
Stay close after start date
We check in at 30, 60, and 90 days with the new hire and the hiring manager both. If something is off, we want to know early, while it is still fixable. That habit is most of how we hit 92% retention.
What “Vetted” Means on a Supply Chain Search.
Every candidate we send has been through a technical screen run by a recruiter who can tell a real planning record from a padded one. No junior bench. No farmed-out calls. We ask how they handled a stockout, what they actually did during the last big demand swing, how they ran a supplier through a quality miss, and the unglamorous cycle-count and master-data work that quietly decides whether the plan holds up when the quarter gets ugly.
“Three of our last supply chain placements were a demand planning manager, a strategic sourcing lead, and a distribution center director. All three closed inside three weeks because we had the pipeline built before the reqs opened. Two were roles the client had left open for months.”
— Tom Kenaley, KORE1
- Real ownership of a plan, a category, or a network, not adjacent exposure to one
- The systems they actually drove, by name, from SAP and Kinaxis to Manhattan WMS
- Volume and complexity that matches your operation, SKUs, sites, and lanes
- How they perform under disruption, not just when the forecast behaves
- Culture and floor presence for the roles that run a building or a shift
Building out the whole operation? Our manufacturing staffing team covers the plant floor and production leadership, and our construction staffing crew handles the skilled trades when you are standing up a new distribution center or plant.
Common Questions
How fast can KORE1 fill a supply chain role?
Our average time-to-hire is 17 days, and most planning, procurement, and logistics roles close in two to four weeks depending on seniority.
We keep an active pipeline of pre-screened planners, buyers, and operations leaders, so a new req does not start from a blank job board. That head start matters. For an urgent contract need we have placed a demand planner inside a week. Director and VP searches run longer, because that bench is thin and the strongest people are usually already employed, so we would rather give you an honest three-week timeline than a fast stack of marginal resumes you have to sort through yourself.
Which supply chain roles do you actually staff?
We staff the full chain, from demand and supply planning through procurement, materials, logistics, trade compliance, warehouse operations, and the directors and VPs above them.
That covers the planning side like forecasting and S&OP, the buy side like sourcing and category management, the make side like materials and production planning, and the move-and-deliver side like transportation, distribution, and fulfillment. One contact for the whole function. If you also need the warehouse floor labor or the plant production crew, our light industrial and manufacturing teams run in parallel with the same point of contact.
Do you place contract, direct hire, or both?
Both, plus contract-to-hire and full project teams.
Contract works well for peak season, a leave coverage, or an ERP cutover. Direct hire makes sense when you are building a permanent planning or procurement function. A lot of clients start contract-to-hire on a new role precisely because it lets them watch the person perform against their real plan, their real suppliers, and their real system before anyone signs a permanent offer. Smart way to de-risk a key seat. We will tell you which model fits the work instead of pushing whatever carries the easiest margin for us.
What does a supply chain hire cost in 2026?
Most supply chain professionals land between roughly $75K and $150K base depending on function and seniority, with directors and VPs running well above that.
The spread is wide. A demand planner sits very differently on the scale than a strategic sourcing manager or a distribution center director, and location, industry, and whether the role is on site all move the number again. Contract rates generally run $45 to $110 per hour W-2 depending on the role and the systems required. We share live market data when we scope the search, not after you have already lost a candidate to a counteroffer.
Do you staff for manufacturing, distribution, and 3PL supply chains specifically?
Yes. Manufacturing, distribution, retail and e-commerce, CPG, medical device, and third-party logistics are all core to what we place.
We calibrate the screen to your model, because the same title means different things across them. A planner in high-mix, low-volume manufacturing solves a different problem than one forecasting fast-moving retail SKUs, and a 3PL operations leader lives in client SLAs that a private DC never sees. We match for that context, not just the job title on the posting.
How do you vet supply chain candidates?
Every candidate goes through a technical screen run by a senior recruiter who probes real ownership, the systems they drove, and how they performed under disruption.
We ask people to walk through an actual problem. A stockout they inherited, a supplier that missed, a network they had to reroute, a forecast that fell apart. The padding comes apart quickly. That conversation surfaces the difference between someone who supported a plan and someone who actually owned it when the numbers got hard. If your team runs a specific ERP, planning tool, or compliance requirement, we build that into the screen before anyone reaches your inbox.
Can you help staff a supply chain systems or ERP project too?
Yes. When a search crosses into the technology layer, our supply chain IT staffing team places the SAP, Kinaxis, Manhattan, and integration talent that runs alongside the planning and operations roles.
Plenty of supply chain hiring is really two searches at once. You need the planner who owns the process and the analyst or systems lead who keeps the tool honest. We cover both without handing you off to a second agency, so an S/4HANA migration or a WMS implementation gets the functional and technical benches from one point of contact. See our supply chain IT staffing page for that side of the house.
Ready to Build a Supply Chain Team That Holds Under Pressure?
The pool of people who can actually run a plan, a category, or a network through real volatility is small, and the wrong hire shows up in your service level and your working capital. We have spent two decades placing operations and industrial talent and years getting deep on planning, procurement, and logistics specifically. Tell us what you are running and we will bring you the people who can run it.