Wabel, the private-label sourcing expert, continues to help buyers at large retail chains along their sourcing journeys with the launch of the Wabel Sourcing Button, a connected device that can be placed right on the buyer’s office desk. It is as easy as pushing a button and getting connected to the right supplier.
The Wabel Sourcing Button is the newest product that Wabel has started to offer the 50 European retail groups already using its sourcing services.
Busy Buyers
Buyers are extremely busy, often multitasking between internal coordination meetings with other departments, price negotiations with existing suppliers, regulation compliance and reporting. Little time is left for sourcing new suppliers.
At the same time, private-label products remain a key success factor for retailers. They are a strong contributor to retailer loyalty and generate higher margins than national-brand products, at a time when the wider retail industry is challenged on profits.
However, private labels are challenged by national brands that are accelerating on innovation and being aggressive on price in order to gain market share. It is therefore critical for each retail chain to make sure that it is fast when introducing innovation, always making sure that it remains competitive from a price point of view, especially at a time when the discounters are achieving double-digit growth in countries like the United Kingdom.
Private-label sourcing is therefore strategic for large European retail chains. Today’s sourcing is tomorrow’s commercial success.
Complex Process
The sourcing process is complex, especially when it involves finding a new supplier. Most retailers encounter difficulties when maintaining an up-to-date database of potential suppliers, and to keep track of their innovations. In addition, for suppliers, it is extremely difficult to identify and meet the right buyer at a large retailer, and when they manage to do it, it is only to discover that they missed the tender period, or that the next one is in six months.
Wabel facilitates the whole process for the private-label industry and has designed a set of services to match the right private-label buyers with the right suppliers, at the right time.
Wabel is already well known for its category summits, which bring together best-in-class buyers and suppliers from all across Europe for pre-qualified face-to-face meetings, its conferences, in which retailers introduce their on-boarding process to potential suppliers, and its website, www.wabel.com, where buyers from all over the world can access an up-to-date database of 7,500 qualified private-label suppliers of food, household and personal-care products.
Wabel Sourcing Button
With the Wabel Sourcing Button, Wabel is going one step further in facilitating the sourcing process. The Wabel Sourcing Button is a connected device, placed right on the buyer’s desk.
When pushed, the button immediately informs a Wabel sourcing expert, who then calls the buyer within ten minutes to qualify the sourcing request and to start shortlisting the best suppliers.
Wabel then searches its 7,500-strong database to identify the most relevant suppliers and alerts the buyer about the opportunity (with or without mentioning the retailer’s name, depending on the retailer's instructions).
The first buttons have been in place since the end of December, at the largest retailers and foodservice companies in France and in Belgium. Wabel plans to provide 3,000 sourcing buttons to private-label buyers at the 150 largest retail chains and foodservice companies in Europe before the end of 2017.
For more information, visit www.wabel.com
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