CPG supply chains: What are they doing?

Filed in archive General on November 24, 2008

There is this interesting interview recently published by SCDigest which highlights some of the developments and priorities in CPG and retail sector in supply chain management. You can read the whole article here, however these are my takeaways:

- The companies in CPG area are considering forecast accuracy as THE single important indicator in their supply chain. AMR Research has reported that Demand Forecast Accuracy is the most important single supply chain metric in their Hierarchy of Supply Chain Metrics because it is a leading driver of proper inventory investment, customer service levels and distribution needs.

- Collaboration in developing new products has now involves customers as well as industry partners; companies are starting to work with customers and suppliers on design elements. This accelerates new product introductions and reduces problems including out-of-stocks and eliminates some of the surprises that arise in the rollout process.

- The emphasis on downstream supply chain visibility has increased and as it can be seen goods manufacturers really start to better leverage downstream data like Point of Sale (POS) information to get as close to the end consumer.