supply chain

noun

plural supply chains

: the chain of processes, businesses, etc. by which a commodity is produced and distributed : the companies, materials, and systems involved in manufacturing and delivering goods

The pandemic has disrupted nearly every aspect of the global supply chain—that's the usually invisible pathway of manufacturing, transportation and logistics that gets goods from where they are manufactured, mined or grown to where they are going. At the end of the chain is another company or a consumer who has paid for the finished product.

—Peter S. Goodman

Everyday life in the United States is acutely dependent on the perpetual motion of the supply chain, in which food and medicine and furniture and clothing all compete for many of the same logistical resources. … [W]hen a finite supply of packaging can't keep up with demand, when there aren't enough longshoremen or truck drivers or postal workers, when a container ship gets wedged sideways in one of the world's busiest shipping lanes—the effects ripple outward for weeks or months, emptying shelves and raising prices in ways that can seem random. All of a sudden, you can't buy kettlebells or canned seltzer.

—Amanda Mull

Examples of supply chain in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

With this, analysts have begun comparing communication flow to the supply chain of decision-making. —Jason Phillips, USA Today, 24 Sep. 2025

The deal between Symbotic and Nyobolt is meant to elongate the battery life on AMRs, which are quickly gaining traction among supply chain players. —Meghan Hall, Sourcing Journal, 24 Sep. 2025

Electrochemical processes succeed only if the electricity is cheap and clean enough or uses dramatically less energy than alternative supply chains, including the embodied energy of shipping and disposal. —Kapil Kajal, Interesting Engineering, 23 Sep. 2025

When deployed in real-world systems, AI transforms climate action from incremental to exponential—optimizing energy use, accelerating materials discovery, improving agricultural efficiency, and strengthening supply chains. —Preston Fore, Fortune, 22 Sep. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

1948, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for supply chain

• aeroplane
• appertain
• ascertain
• capitaine
• cassegrain
• cellophane
• chatelaine
• counterpane
• entertain
• gethsemane
• halothane
• hurricane