Route to Market & Supply Chain Blog

I used to be a big fan of Formula 1. Sunday afternoons in rainy UK in front of BBC2 watching either the Grand Prix or the 40 overs a side John Player League cricket – weather permitting, bliss. Jasper Carrott once expressed surprise at how anyone…

When a company asks me to take a look at their S&OP process yet boasts a Forecast Accuracy (FA) of 98%, alarm bells are immediately sound. If you are at a genuine level of 98% then of course there is a little more incremental improvement possible…

Do you agree that Supply Chains seem to evolve very, very slowly? I cannot recall any major ground-breaking innovation in recent times. Yes, we have had bar-coding, RFID and S&OP etc but nothing that sticks out as significant or a major leap…

You have completed your weekly shop at one of the well-known International Key Accounts (IKA). Pushing your trolley around the well stocked aisles you selected what you needed and piled up the goodies. A full trolley this week as there were several…

Increasingly, most multinational FMCG/Brewing/Pharmaceutical companies have implemented some form of Sales & Operational Planning (S&OP) or further integrated planning. They will have gone through the undoubted pain of getting people together to…

This latest blog is unashamedly about football or soccer depending on where you live, but with a Supply Chain related theme. If football -the correct term, actually – is not your cup of steaming Lipton then thanks for clicking and see you next time.…

Is your Route To Market (RTM) network sluggish? Does your system frequently stall and cause frustration? Sales performance not going to plan? Competitors streaking ahead of you? Is your boss at Corporate HQ giving you a rough time? What can you do?…

Whether your deployment of Sales & Operational Planning (S&OP) is as solid as a fine old Cheddar or is more like Emmental, you will benefit from This new free e-book. The Enchange S&OP e-book tells you what S&OP is, does, how it works and how to…

For people of a certain age from the UK the high calorie, nutty chocolate bar in a brown-blue-yellow wrapper made by Mars Inc will always be a Marathon (before you ask, the USA Marathon was a Curly-Wurly type product). Snickers just does not work…

I took a look at how technology has changed the way Supply Chains work in a previous blog. During my recent trip to foreign parts – yes, Birkenhead and most of UK is foreign to me now – I saw modern technology in action like I have never seen before…

The Oxford versus Cambridge University boat race took place at the end of March and Oxford emerged as the victors. This is an historic event which has taken place every year since 1829 with the exception of the 2 World Wars and teams have contained…

Returning home from my Dubai holiday I spent some time in Duty Free electrical section looking at everything I do not need or in fact, do not know how to operate and never will. I was actually in the market for a new electric shaver as mine had…

People who work in fast food outlets – I really cannot label them as restaurants – must have specific training in dealing with non-standard orders. Can you imagine the temptation to groan when in a crowded outlet someone asks for a Muck Chicken…

Is anybody good at forecasting? Meteorologists have had centuries of trying and still the weather catches us by surprise. I think this is particularly so in UK where weather related discussions are an important part of daily life. If people paid no…

While you are tackling your day to day routine of crises, meetings, strategy and more while fending off the results pressure from global HQ you often lose a grip on the reality of how your company is operating. Creeping inefficiency can become the…