Boston Beer's Jim Koch is testing an idea that seeks to streamline the supply chain when shipping beer from the brewer to the wholesaler. Instead of distributors forecasting a month or two in advance and placing orders, and then the brewery running long runs of each SKU and shipping it throughout the month to the distributor to store for 20 to 30 (or 40) days, his proposal is to see what the distributor has sold of his products in the last one, two, or three days, and then just ship him that in mixed-case loads throughout the month, thereby dramatically reducing distributor inventory and eliminating the need for distributor forecasting and ordering .