The newly launched Perfect Order initiative aims to deliver substantial shopper benefits with the potential to save the consumer goods industry several million pounds in operating costs.
The new programme from GS1 UK will help retailers and suppliers tackle hidden operating costs, delays and process inefficiencies in the inbound grocery supply chain, while addressing the need to create the seamless shopping experience that consumers increasingly expect. Currently, suppliers are seeing added complexities and costs to their business as they strive to meet the differing requirements set down by the major grocery retailers.
The initial stage of the Perfect Order programme will include the development and adoption of a set of industry-agreed standards for inbound logistics, ensuring that the retailers’ service requirements are met in full. This part of the programme will involve a joint industry workgroup, made up of both grocery retailers and suppliers, including Bakkavor, Boots, Coca-Cola Enterprises, Mondelez, Morrisons, Nestlé, Procter & Gamble, Tesco, Turners of Soham and Unilever, with GS1 UK acting as an independent facilitator.
Some of the key benefits of the new initiative include better utilisation of vehicles, a less customised and more direct goods-receiving process for suppliers, and, ultimately, better product availability for shoppers.
Over the next three years, the Perfect Order programme will evolve into a full set of industry-agreed, harmonised ways of working that, with the commitment of all parties involved, make for a simpler inbound logistics process and also create the opportunity to generate significant savings.
Speaking on the programme, Harshal Gore, quality assurance director at GS1 UK, said, “We worked with like-minded retailer and supplier member companies to create the Perfect Order programme, which we see as being a catalyst for improving both trading relationships and operating efficiencies in the end-to-end supply-chain process. In the current environment, with all aspects of operating costs being under review, we believe that this is an initiative the industry cannot ignore.”
Simon Mardle of logistics and change management at Tesco said, “The GS1 UK Perfect Order programme helps support Tesco’s passion for putting the customer at the heart of everything we do. To help achieve this, it’s key we work with our suppliers in new and different ways and help to make ways of working simpler and easier for all of us."
The work is a great example of where "we have to go even further" and work collaboratively across the entire industry to achieve better performance for all, he said.
"It will help us to fundamentally change the way we engage with our suppliers and deliver a significant cultural shift in our business. This couldn’t be a better time for us to implement an industry standard.”
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