DaimlerChrysler and Schenker Deutschland have officially opened a supplier park in Bremen, Germany. At the start of production of the new Mercedes-Benz C-Class, the industrial park was tailored specifically to supply the parts and vehicle modules for the assembly of this series at the Bremen production plant. Schenker Deutschland AG will use the park to combine parts provided by more than 20 sub-suppliers and then route them to and in sequence with the assembly lines down.

According to Peter Schabert, Head of the DaimlerChrysler production plant in Bremen, "the basis for our actions is always what our customers want. And they want more individual features, so much so that practically no two identical cars leave the assembly line. The industrial park is an important facility for the Bremen production plant because it helps us ensure that our customers receive their customized vehicle as quickly as possible and by the agreed delivery date."

At present Schenker Deutschland introduces about 21,000 vehicle parts and modules per day to DaimlerChrysler's production process in Bremen. Around 100 Schenker employees unload roughly 50 trucks, which bring parts from German, European and overseas suppliers, at the industrial park's goods-in area every day. The parts are then booked, put into buffer storage and delivered on demand to the plant, six kilometers away.

Schenker coordinates the traffic in goods between sub-suppliers and the plant at the industrial park. Once DaimlerChrysler confirms the call for delivery of parts signal, they commission them from the buffer storage and provide them for delivery to the plant by group trucks. On average it takes about five hours from the call-for-delivery signal to Schenker to the part being fitted into the vehicle. Time-critical components such as vehicle specific wiring harnesses and instrument panel harnesses, which, if missing, would bring the assembly lines to a complete standstill, are brought to the assembly line directly in a specially supervised procedure. The industrial park runs on two or three-shift operations analogous to production with an average of 116 runs (3-shift operations) per day between the plant and the park. Bundling supplies saves several hundred truckloads being delivered by various different sub-suppliers and then having to be handled directly at the plant.

Construction began in December 2005 and the park has been phased into operation since October 1, 2006; with the production of Mercedes-Benz' new C-Class at the Bremen plant accelerating this process.

According to Hans-Jörg Hager, "The industrial park is based on our concept of the Schenker supply center. Its high level of flexibility and adaptability means fundamental changes in production numbers and changes in sub-suppliers can be implemented at short notice. All that at the highest levels of security: all processes and labeling are standardized according to the German Association of the Automotive Industry norms."