Route to Market & Supply Chain Blog

During my recent travels I met with two Sales (or Business Development Directors if you’re posh) from well known FMCG companies to discuss an assessment review of their Route To Market (RTM) networks. Surprisingly, neither was interested and gave a…

Your Supply Chain has been revised, optimised, transformed or even blue sky’d – yes, honestly have been present when this was used but managed to stifle a guffaw into a cup of hot chocolate. What a smooth running well oiled machine it has become.…

In a past life I ran the Supply Chain for an FMCG company in the 6 Gulf Co-Operation Council (GCC) countries plus Yemen in the Middle East. The Distribution model was one different legal entity per territory even for the largest market of Saudi…

The “Famous Last words” of people can be intriguing, rude and frequently very, very funny yet equally they can be complete nonsense. In the context of the FMCG Supply Chain, “Famous Last Words” are usually uttered just before something disastrous or…

Ok, I know I should not have gone there. It was Sunday and well before the live Premier League football on the TV. The weather was cold, the air was full of drizzle and as I turned off the overgrown roundabout the scale of my folly dawned; the IKEA…

Dear Drinks Agony Aunt, I have reached the end of my patience. I’m drinking too much coffee, too much beer, I smoke like a chimney, I’m not eating properly and I just cannot sleep. I have not managed to watch or play any of my favourite sports and…

Do you need to improve the availability of your products in the Traditional Trade? Do you know the strengths and weaknesses of your distributor network? Do you know what really happens after your products leave the warehouse? Is your network managed…

FMCG producers are often far too ready to blame their Distributors when sales do not go to plan and targets are not met. However, it is rarely all their fault particularly if producers are not clear on what is expected. To help Producers understand…

Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. Albert Einstein How many of you will be reaching for an electric cigarette or giving up smoking altogether for the New Year? How long will it be before visits to the…

We have invested in a new waste bin for the kitchen. Even with our strict regime of recycling as much waste as possible that small flip-up bin inside a cupboard just was not big enough. Yes, the lid dutifully popped up when the cupboard door was…

Dear Santa, I have been a very good FMCG CEO this year, I promise. If you want, you can check with my shareholders. They know how good I have been this year. Apart from the out of stocks of course, oh and the little mistake where we had to write…

Ok, so maybe not for life but FMCG Distributors will have a significant impact on your sales performance, probably your personal bonus and therefore your CEO career! How have you treated them this year? Were they the usual pain in the proverbial -…

Client: Santa Claus aka Father Christmas, Kris Kringle, St Nick Market: Most of the World Scope: Reindeer To Market (RTM) Distribution Deliverable: Evaluation of RTM against sector benchmarks Summary of Evaluation Click here to enlarge The project…

The summer of 2004. It was 3 weeks after I had changed the job and the company. It was a new (Supply Chain) position in an FMCG company with many people speaking native French. At that time, the mayor of Bucharest- the future Romanian president…

I previously blogged about the reality of FMCG Traditional Trade (TT) Route To Market (RTM) distribution and described the drivers and behaviours in each party as the monthly plans inevitably imploded. Let us now get out the crystal ball and stare…