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Energy efficiency represents a key resource for economic and social development, providing substantial benefits to different stakeholders, ranging from the entities which develop energy efficient measures to everyone in society. In addition to cost savings, multiple benefits can be achieved by supporting a better alignment between energy issues and strategic business priorities: e.g., improved competitiveness, profitability, quality, etc. Thus, energy efficiency can be a strategic advantage, not just a marginal issue, for companies. However, most firms, especially small and medium enterprises (SMEs), face many problems and, in some cases, hostility when trying to effectively implement energy efficiency actions. The most dominant barriers are the access to capital and the lack of awareness (especially in terms of life cycle cost effects). The supply chain viewpoint represents one of the main opportunities for overcoming those barriers and improving energy performance even for weaker companies. Since the current literature on energy efficiency and practical approaches to ensure energy efficiency mainly focus on energy performance on a single-firm basis, this paper aims to provide a systematic review of papers on the integration of energy efficiency in supply chain design and management published in academic journal, thereby defining potential research streams to close the gaps in the literature. A number of literature reviews have been published focusing on specific aspects of sustainable or on green supply chain management; however, to the best of our knowledge, no review has focused on the energy efficiency issue. Firstly, the present paper shows how considering energy consumption in supply chain management can contribute to more energy-efficient processes from a systemic point of view. Then, the review methodology used is defined and the sampled papers are analyzed and categorized based on the different approaches they propose. From these analyses, potential future research streams are outlined.

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The rapid pace of e-commerce development has resulted in several manufacturers selling their products online to stay competitive and increase accessibility to their products. This paper investigates the effect of adopting a dual-channel (comprised of a traditional retail channel and a direct online channel) on the performance of a two-level supply chain (manufacturer-retailer). Through this strategy, the manufacturer would like to offer customized products through a direct online channel (i.e. make-to-order), in addition to offering its standard product through the traditional retail channel (i.e. make-to-stock). The objective is to maximize the total profit of the system when this strategy is adopted. A linear demand function is used for both channels in which the demand depends on the selling prices (markup margin), the quoted delivery lead-time, and product differentiation. This investigation is compared to a benchmark scenario, where the supply chain is comprised of a single-channel strategy (retail channel only) where one type of product is offered; the standard product. In both strategies, the paper analyzes the change in the profit, markup margin and the inventory decisions that result from adopting the dual-channel strategy. The findings of this paper demonstrate that adding a customized-product online channel would increase the profit of the centralized supply chain system. However, it created a conflict due to competition between the retail and online channels. A numerical example and sensitivity analysis have been used to demonstrate this effect and to draw specific managerial insights