With gas prices approaching $4.00 per gallon (and that?s economy fuel) it may be time to figure out how to save pennies that you might not have focused on historically in order to continue working with your legacy fuel suppliers.

With gas prices approaching $4.00 per gallon (and that?s economy fuel) it may be time to figure out how to save pennies that you might not have focused on historically in order to continue working with your legacy fuel suppliers. Are you aware of other sources of supply? Is it possible to save a few pennies per gallon by making your suppliers compete for your business?

When the price of oil goes up, and today crude futures retreated slightly after topping 135 U.S. dollars a barrel for the first time; we hear mostly about the price of our gas at the pump. In the U.S. we don?t expect to pay this much for that precious commodity we all need in order to get to work, drive the kids to all of their activities, buy groceries, go to the doctor, and when time permits enjoy our leisure activities. What we don?t hear a lot about is the price of all the related fuel products like diesel, kerosene or jet fuel. The truth is they are all going up.

In our SafeSourceIt? North American supplier database there are 3,292 U.S. suppliers in the major category fuel. This data can be further filtered into sub categories such as kerosene, diesel etc. Data can then filtered by region, zip code and a variety of other classifications. The same data is available for Canada and Mexico.

With the availability of this type of data, retailers may be able to reduce or hold their fuel prices. In most cases fuel either directly or indirectly represents one of many retailers top spend categories. Watching rack rates daily and having new sources of supply that are also trying to survive compete for your business provides a formula for saving pennies and takes the emotion out of the decision making process. In the food industry where net profit regularly runs at 1% or less pennies add up.

I know I?d go to a pump that was priced at $3.99 per gallon instead of one next to it priced at $4.00.

I look forward to your comments

Ron

Today?s retailers have so many initiatives on their plates that trying to focus on what at first does not seem to be their most important initiative (Going Green) can create a type of corporate gridlock that stops the organization from moving forward in a timely manner.

Today?s retailers have so many initiatives on their plates that trying to focus on what at first does not seem to be their most important initiative (Going Green) can create a type of corporate gridlock that stops the organization from moving forward in a timely manner. The key is to not bite off more than you can chew and to set realistic goals and timeframes. There are so many external organizations trying to share their green initiatives today and set their own company standards so high that they hope to become the standard for everyone. As a result, volumes of data exist that would drive many organization crazy just trying to sort thorough it in order to come up with their own companies guideline.

So, where should a company begin? First of all, companies need to set guidelines for their company. In order to set guidelines, companies need to realize going in that guidelines are intended to be ‘living documents’, and will be updated on a regular basis going forward. In other words, by their nature they are not complete. Since we are talking about the environment, let?s make sure we don?t go down the path of health, safety and other areas even though they are related. Crossover with these areas will occur naturally as you focus on your guidelines for those specific areas later. Today we are here to talk about the environment. So what do we focus on? A starting point for the environment will always include the following. As you try to break this format down further, you will find that almost all areas fit into the following categories. As an example, contaminated land would fall into land management.

Energy Conservation
Water Conservation
Hazardous Materials Handling
Waste Management
Noise Pollution
Land Management
Wastewater Management

An important piecet of any corporate policy once outlined is to make sure that you share your guidelines with your trading partners and hold them accountable to doing the same thing in order to earn their business with you.

Once you begin to focus on tgoing green, it?s amazing how you will transfer it to your personal life. I know it?s personal for me.

I look forward to your comments.

Ron

Do you ever wonder why the entire hubbub when we talk about the environment or the ecology? What does it really mean when we ask companies are you green enough?

Do you ever wonder why the entire hubbub when we talk about the environment or the ecology? What does it really mean when we ask companies are you green enough? Or, are you doing all you can to protect the environment. Do we even really care? What does it really mean?

Well, apparently we do care and companies that want to prosper should pay attention to the groundswell of consumers that are willing to pay more to get more in the way of safer products from companies that go beyond product safety to also manufacture in a way the protects the environment for our children and their children after we are gone.

A Wells Fargo/Gallop phone survey in 2007 of 600 small business owners surveyed on the environment asked the following questions.

1. Should additional standards on carbon dioxide, greenhouse gases be implemented? Forty three percent of respondents rated that a priority. Thirty seven percent rated it a top priority and nineteen percent said it was not a priority
2. On the question do you favor or oppose setting higher emissions and pollution standards for business and industry, seventy five percent favored it while twenty five percent opposed it.
3. When asked if they would be willing to pay more for good, and services if you new they were environmentally friendly, sixty six percent said yes and thirty percent said no.

During this political season any politician that received eighty percent, seventy five percent or sixty six percent of any vote would consider it a landslide and an affirmation of their political agenda.

In a closer vote, an Allianz Global investor survey of over one thousand adults of whom only seventeen percent had invested in a particular mutual fund because it was developing technologies or approaches to address environmental problems. When asked the question would you invest in such companies or mutual funds in the next year, forty nine percent said yes.

So, suppliers? are you green enough. Your constituents are watching and voting with their dollars. If you?re not you should look for ways to get there quicker and take advantage of tools that can help you do it.

I know I look more closely now at what my personal carbon footprint is and the impact it has on future generations,

I look forward to your comments.

Ron

I read two short but interesting articles lately. They indicated how not being ecologically sound in one area can have a potentially long term negative impact on safety in the food chain. One article was titled ?Study finds lead in game meat?. The other was titled ?Fla. warns of mercury levels in frog legs?.

1. Providing alert data on a daily basis as to product recalls and safety warnings.
2. Trace warnings back to the original source of supply automatically.
3. Require that suppliers meet required safety certifications to participate in their database.
4. Provide a regular purge of suppliers that do not comply.
5. Adhere to a strict RFI process for new suppliers being added to databases.
6. Rate suppliers that are offered to retailers as new sources of supply.
7. Monitor regulatory agencies for new standards and include them in the database.

1. Providing alert data on a daily basis as to product recalls and safety warnings.
2. Trace warnings back to the original source of supply automatically.
3. Require that suppliers meet required safety certifications to participate in their database.
4. Provide a regular purge of suppliers that do not comply.
5. Adhere to a strict RFI process for new suppliers being added to databases.
6. Rate suppliers that are offered to retailers as new sources of supply.
7. Monitor regulatory agencies for new standards and include them in the database.

I went to my local pharmacy today to pick up my monthly prescription. I must admit

1. The supplier can not divulge the original source of their product.
2. Products offered do not meet FDA dosage approvals or your specifications.
3. Supplier?s price book offers generic products that are not approved for use in the USA.
4. The brand name or product names are not spelled correctly
5. Payment terms requested are unusual.
6. Ask to see the wholesale license for the state you are located in.
7. Suppliers contact information is from outside of the USA.
8. Product samples look tampered with or are of poor quality in either packaging or printing.

1. Wash your hands face and body after playing.
2. Take off clothes worn, turn inside out and wash separately.
3. Field custodians should water the fields before and after use to reduce dust.

1. Ask where products these organizations buy come from.
2. Ask what components go into making these products
3. Ask what consumer safety standards were followed in the manufacture of these products.

I was reading an Aberdeen report recently titled Building a Green Supply Chain . The report quoted and age old reality. ?You can?t improve what you don?t measure?.