Archive for the ‘Retail Supply Chain’ Category
Friday, September 3rd, 2010
We’ve all known for a while that our seat partners look over our shoulders to see who we are and what we do. I told him I was reading an Aberdeen business brief and who and what they do. I went on to explain that our company was focused on e-procurement tools for the retailers. He introduced him self as a private business owner with his two brothers and that he had experience biding in reverse auctions with Ariba and Free Markets.
We discussed SafeSourcing’s offerings and ultimately came around to what made e-procurement events successful for his company in the past as a prospective supplier and what would encourage them to participate again even if they did not happen to be awarded the business in a particular event. His take was that this was initially an educational process for their company and ultimately would become a way to do old things in a new way. He also suggested the following
1. Openly communicate with prospective suppliers
2. Make sure they understand everything and comfortable
3. Make sure they have no open questions.
With that as an understanding I offer the following list of sample questions one might consider when inviting a supplier as a new participant.
1. Does the supplier understand that there is no cost to them to participate?
2. Do they understand they will be trained at know charge?
3. Do they understand event timing and requirements?
4. Does the supplier understand the terms being used and how they apply to an e-procurement event such as? In fact, do they understand what a reverse or forward auction is?
a. Reserve Price
b. Proxy Volumes
c. Low Quote
d. Proxy quote
e. Funds
f. Terms
g. Notes
h. Extensions
i. Matching quotes
j. Event rules
k. Product specifications
l. Samples
m. Award of business
At the heart of it, it comes down to something we all know but don’t always practice and as such negatively impacts the sustainability of processes that just make good sense. And that is that the supplier is your customer too and the customer comes first and should be treated the way you would like to be treated.
We look forward to and appreciate your comments.
Posted in B2b Reverse Auction, B2b Supply Chain, E-procurement, E-procurement Solutions, E-procurement Tools, E-supply Chain, Retail Supply Chain, Reverse Auction Procurement, Strategic Sourcing
Thursday, August 19th, 2010
Quite honestly this is a fairly complex question so the answer is not simple. To begin with let’s take a look at just what a market (retail) exchange is.
One of the earliest exchanges in the retail space was called the Retail Exchange which was sponsored by some very large retailers and is still available today from a company that bought the system from its retailer sponsors. As simply as possible, a Market (Retail) Exchange is a business to business or B2B E-commerce platform that allows Suppliers, Resellers, and their customers or buyers to offer, purchase and manage their goods and services in a simple and effective way. Typically an organization must be a member of the exchange in order to participate. Once a member the organization can then conduct business with other organizations by establishing on line connections with each other. Typically exchanges are a shared hosting environment and in some cases for very large companies dedicated server implementations. In recent years exchanges have migrated to SaaS or software as a service models in order to address wider markets.
The success of an exchange is based on the number of suppliers or resellers that belong to it and their willingness to participate with a retailer for their business. The activity is more of hands off approach once your offer is posted that can include punch outs to a supplier’s website and catalog services for sourcing of products.
From my perspective I like the personal touch of the historical RFX process in the form of a SaaS full service offering that actively engages new sources of supply and sells them on wanting your business. There is a much smaller investment from both a financial and resource perspective. If you want to learn more about the RFX process please visit SafeSourcing Blog archive or the SafeSourcing Wiki.
We look forward to and appreciate your comments.
Posted in B2b Reverse Auction, B2b Supply Chain, E-procurement Solutions, Online Procurement, Procurement Outsourcing, Procurement Solutions, Retail Supply Chain
Tuesday, July 13th, 2010
There was a point in time that sourcing products from China insured a low cost for your product. Then the price of oil went through the roof and melting down containers returned more than trying ship product in them. Even with oil down somewhat from that time, costs are increasing in China as plant safety and quality and worker safety and quality improves. However, there are still probably bargains to be had, but caution should be your guiding word.
A great example of this is a recent find by Chinese officials of tons of milk products tainted with Melamine. If this sounds familiar, it should. This was an issue in 2008 on which this author posted. The scandal actually killed 6 babies and made hundreds of thousands sick at the time. China actually executed two individuals for producing or selling toxic milk. So here we are in 2010 and the problem has still not been totally corrected and we are talking about products that are only sold in China. It would seem that a country would be more concerned about the quality and safety of products made by the Chinese for the Chinese consumer.
As such, companies need to complete the due diligence necessary to insure that the products you are planning to source include detailed raw materials descriptions, formulas and certifications that are mandated globally to insure product quality, safety and environmental impact standards.
Ask your solutions provider what their vetting procedures are for including suppliers in their database?
We look forward to and appreciate your comments.
Posted in B2b Supply Chain, E-supply Chain, Global E-procurement, Retail Supply Chain, Sourcing Safe Foods, Sourcing Safe Products, Supply Chain Procurement
Friday, June 25th, 2010
Managing a retail supply chain depending on how involved you want to become in the process includes your products and how they get to you, your consumer and the service you provide for the product post sale. This also includes all data about the product in a procure to pay process such as purchase order information, contract information and delivery coordination and status along the way. All of the above requires management of the related financial data such as payment terms and schedules and other financial data. A good place to start is to break this information down into manageable pieces and see how many people are involved in the process internally and externally and how they collaborate with each other if at all. To the extent that you can not connect the lines may include.
As a retailer, you are an obvious part of the consumers supply chain and in some cases also a supplier to other retailers. The network depends on the product but can include yourself, raw material providers, manufacturers, wholesalers, distributors, third party logistic companies or 3PL’s, and other types of transportation companies. Managing the collaboration of your supply chain is what will ultimately differentiate you from your competition. It’s up to you.
As your procurement solution provider how they might tie all of these disparate organizations together for you.
We look forward to and appreciate your comments.
Posted in B2b Supply Chain, E-supply Chain, Retail Supply Chain, Supply Chain Procurement
Tuesday, June 22nd, 2010
A great place to start is an organization called the The Construction Safety Council which was founded in 1989. Ask you conduction partners if they are a member.
The CSC is a non-for-profit organization dedicated to the advancement of safety and health interests in the field of construction throughout the world. It was chartered by a board of directors composed mostly of large construction company owners and operators whose vision and leadership made the organization possible. Since its humble beginnings in 1989, the organization has quickly grown to become a world class professional construction consortium with associations that span the globe. With an emphasis on quality and customer service, all of the construction safety and health resources and loss reduction tools developed by the Construction Safety Council have been designed to maximize positive impact on your safety program.
The SafeSourceIt™ Global Supplier Database has hundreds of construction companies that are held accountable to these types of standards. Are you asking all the right questions or is your solution provider?
We look forward to and appreciate your comments
Posted in Business Sourcing, Procurement Solutions, Retail Supply Chain, Sourcing Safe Products, Sourcing Strategy
Friday, May 14th, 2010
We have posted many time on the need for a traceable supply chain and the need for better due diligence throughout the procurement process including plant, farm and other source inspections. Keeping this data in a format that is searchable in the supplier vetting process is paramount to mitigating risk to consumers, suppliers, manufacturers and other areas of the supply chain is just to great without it.
Cargill Inc. which is a great agribusiness announced yesterday that they were responsible for the life shattering injuries suffered by Stephanie Smith by eating a contaminated burger in 2007. The parties agreed to settle the law suite and the terms were not disclosed beyond that Cargill agreed to cover her care for the rest of her life.
The debate on food safety continues and as it does drives the need for compliance at all levels of the supply chain from the farm to the table and the capability of tracing finished goods from the consumer to the source in order to. Without these tools issues like this will continue to happen.
We look forward to and appreciate your comments.
Posted in B2b Supply Chain, E-supply Chain, Procurement Outsourcing, Retail Supply Chain, Sourcing Safe Foods, Sourcing Safe Products, Supply Chain Procurement
Thursday, May 13th, 2010
This author generally begins discussing this subject with our customers and prospects during the discovery phase of our engagements. It helps to get us all on the same page and as such we get a lot of different definitions. Quite frankly we get almost as many as the number of people we discuss the subject with. Surprisingly the process which is quite simple as a definition is not any different from when I first learned it over 40 years ago in the U.S. Air Force other than its automation provided by modern procurement tools.
Typically procurement consists of seven (7) steps. Where the confusion generally enters is that each step can have a process of its own or be interrelated with another step in the process. An example would be the contract lifecycle that easily fits within the negotiation cycle and the renewal cycle. Another might be that information gathering which is the generally accepted first step in the process can apply to multiple issues such as information gathering for the related product or services such as specifications as well as the information gathering of prospective supplier data.
As such, the simple steps to the procurement lifecycle that most individuals generally agree upon are as follows.
1. Information gathering
2. Supplier contact
3. Background review
4. Negotiation
5. Fulfillment
6. Consumption
7. Renewal
Most times keeping this simple model in mind will allow retail procurement professionals to answer the question where are we in the process when a project gets stalled or off track.
We look forward to and appreciate your comments.
Posted in Business Sourcing, Procurement Company, Procurement Purchasing, Procurement Solutions, Procurement Tool, Product Procurement, Retail Supply Chain, Sourcing Strategy, Strategic Sourcing, Supply Chain Procurement
Wednesday, May 12th, 2010
In the Monday May 10th issue of USA TODAY the Money Section carried an article titled “Suppliers can’t meet demand” by Paul Davidson. The article went on to discuss that the economic rebound has been so robust that manufacturers are struggling so much with demand that it is causing huge bottlenecks in the supply chain. The article also went on to discuss that companies are reluctant to hire to meet the demand because they are not totally convinced that the current rebound will last.
The retail supply chain is something that this author has posted on dozens of times from the importance of a robust retail supply chain to how to manage your relationships with current and new sources of supply. A significant part of that is to have secondary and tertiary sources of supply that you can rely upon. By example, during the most recent H1N1 flu outbreak, Safesourcing was able to provide multiple sources of surgical mask suppliers to one of our customers that had not been able to find them elsewhere for sales in their stores. They did not know of these suppliers. They are also a very large company. Although this particular issue was caused by panic buying, it is still a supply and demand problem and correlates very well to the USA TODAY article. The message here is, don’t wait until a time of panic or increased prosperity to work and plan for spikes in the supply chain that may cause your customers pain.
Following are five Safesourcing blog posts from 2008 that should provide some good base reading on this subject.
1. Is critical thinking in supplier selection a key to quality auctions? You bet!
2. Supplier Open Communication. A key to high quality e-procurement events.
3. Supplier-selection-this-may-be-the-most-important-decision-you-make
4. What is retail supply base management?
5. What is the benefit of a large retail supplier database and how do companies use the data to support growing their spend with reverse auctions?
The SafeSourceIt™ Retail Supplier Database contains over 380,000 vetted suppliers.
We look forward to and appreciate your comments
Posted in B2b Supply Chain, E-supply Chain, Retail Supply Chain, Supply Chain Procurement
Friday, May 7th, 2010
It hardly seems possible that we launched our company two years ago. At the time there were indicators for those paying attention of trouble in the global economy but know one had any idea just how bad it was going to get. In hindsight what a time to launch a company. When customers and business partners asked me why, my response was if you are doing what you believe in and the results you promise are true, then there really is no bad time to launch a business.
Our promise has been the same from day one, to reduce the cost of goods and services regardless of a company’s size or the size of the category being sourced. And, while doing so improve quality, safety and environmental focus. Today, two years later our customers will attest to the fact that we have held true to that promise.
Following is a short list of accomplishments that we are very proud of.
1. Over 700 educational blog posts relative to e-procurement issues of importance.
2. Over 1500 useful procurement related wiki terms and definitions.
3. Added an average of more than one new customer for every month in business.
4. Grew our supplier data base to greater than 380,000 retail suppliers
5. Sourced 100’s of categories from commodities to finished goods and services.
6. Sourced categories as small as $5K with savings > 30%.
7. Sourced categories as high as $80M.
8. Never held an e-negotiation event that did not result in savings.
9. Conducted every process in e-procurement including RFI, RFP and RFQ.
10. Installed our product in Asia in a multi lingual implementation.
11. Averaged over 24% savings over two years.
12. Developed a unique process for sourcing small spends for the retail mid market.
13. Grew our database to over a terabyte of data.
14. Helped companies source with environmental and social consciousness
15. Today released SafeContract™ a fully featured hosted Contract Management System.
To our customers thank you for your support. We endeavor to earn your business every day. To our business partners thank you for your guidance during a tough economic period. To the retail industry our goal is to be your best vehicle for reducing costs and improving earnings with an increased focus on corporate social responsibility.
Thank You.
Posted in B2b Reverse Auction, B2b Supply Chain, Business Sourcing, E-procurement, E-procurement Solutions, E-procurement Tools, E-supply Chain, Eprocurement Auction, Global E-procurement, Green eProcurement Practices, Online Procurement, Online Reverse Auction, Procurement Auctioning, Procurement Company, Procurement Outsourcing, Procurement Purchasing, Procurement Solutions, Procurement Tool, Product Procurement, Retail Supply Chain, Reverse Auction, Reverse Auction Procurement, Sourcing Safe Foods, Sourcing Safe Products, Sourcing Strategy, Strategic Sourcing, Supply Chain Procurement
Thursday, May 6th, 2010
Retailers should have continuing success when running prior e-procurement events over again, one area of commonality that has historically made this difficult is a lack of new suppliers.
There is a proper way to insure the sustainability of your reverse auctions going forward. Since you have already conducted or should have conducted your detailed discovery and analysis a robust retail supplier database will allow you to do the following.
1. Conduct a detailed supplier discovery
a. Rank suppliers
i. Size
ii. Experience
iii. References
iv. Environmental certifications
v. Safety Certifications
2. Develop a three year supplier game plan
a. Develop a three year time line for all categories
b. Identify suppliers for each event over the three years
c. Develop a three year rotation schedule for the selected suppliers.
3. Role Play internally each year for a test category
a. Ask the following questions
i. Who will you invite and why
ii. Keep in mind the unique benefits of distributors and manufacturers
iii. Discuss award the business strategies
iv. Review alternate scenarios
v. Review impact on non awarded suppliers
vi. Determine which suppliers will be invited back
vii. Determine what new suppliers from your database search will be invited next year
If you only have the same list you originally used to conduct your historical events, don’t expect savings the 2nd and 3rd time around if market conditions are similar. Or, you could call Safesourcing.
We look forward to and appreciate your comments.
Posted in E-supply Chain, Retail Supply Chain, Sourcing Strategy, Strategic Sourcing, Supply Chain Procurement
