In an industry that survives on a bottom line of one or two percent, a simple mistake in procurement can wipe out an entire years profit.
Todays post is from Ronald D. Southard, CEO at SafeSourcing Inc.
I was talking to a meat buyer recently and it sounded more like talking to a commodity trader. In fact, that is exactly what they are. Data is important, and the breadth of data they need to watch is amazing.
Without getting into detailed spend management, strategic sourcing or analytics, a very simple example of what a retail meat buyer goes through every day should shed some light on the need for talent in the sourcing area.
Consider the following nine questions that a meat buyer might have to consider every day.
1.What is my companies demand for beef products?
2.What is the price of corn?
3.What is the price of diesel?
4.What is the price of plastic?
5.What is the price of paper?
6.What is the price of ink?
7.How do all of these products or interact to impact the price of beef?
8.How do I keep track of all these moving parts and what if I don’t?
9.Is there an index for each of these I should be watching?
That sounds like a commodity trader to me.
One place a meat buyer might turn for help is to their e-procurement solution provider and if they already have a partner and these questions have never come up, maybe it’s time to change solution providers.
If you’d like to learn more about the resources we use at SafeSourcing when developing the strategy for our customers e-procurement events, please contact a SafeSourcing customer services account manager.
We look forward to and appreciate your comments.
