POI Pulse August 28, 2017

Snyder’s-Lance, Farmer John, General Mills, Kraft-Heinz, Diageo, Pernnod-Ricard, Sargento, Daisy Brand, PepsiCo, California Olive Ranch, Windsor Foods, Deoleo, L’Oreal, ACH Foods, Colgate-Palmolive, Walgreen’s, Galderma, Hormel, Dean Foods, Constellation Brands, Blue Buffalo, Energizer, Borden Dairy,  Hershey’s, Bellisio Foods, Bimbo Bakeries,  AAFES, Mondelez, Sysco, Coca-Cola, Nestle, Kimberly Clark, DPSG, Johnson & Johnson,
Perfetti Van Melle, Kellogg’s, JM Smucker, Church & Dwight, Keurig Green Mountain, Musco Family Olive, ConAgra,  Ainsworth Pet Nutrition, Del Monte, Rich Products,  and many others.  By now you should have received your invitation. If not, reach me today at mkantor@p-o-i.org

Realizing Benefits from Trade Improvement: On Demand Webinar Source:
(POI, July 19, 2017)

ACH Food’s Transformation Trade Planning Journey on July 19, 2017 at 2pm will deliver actionable advice.  ACH Food has gone through a transformational program to reinvent business planning and trade management which included the implementation of an integrated business planning solution.Learn more, and view the recording here

Industry luminary and former P&G executive, Andy
Walter, will share strategic insights and best practices on CPG route-to-market and digital transformation from his experiences with P&G. Access the recording here

SERIES: 

Time to get in the hunt. TPM myths and reasons for not automating these key processes explored… and
“busted.” Don’t get left behind!

In our 2017 TPx and Retail Execution Survey we sought to understand the perceived impediments for consumer
goods companies automating their TPM processes with some form of server-based technology. We found it quite telling that 37 of the 77 of
respondents (48%) to this version of the survey do not have a TPM solution…

Now let’s address and attempt to “bust” some of the myths.

Myth 1. Too Expensive:

There is no question that deploying trade promotion optimization (TPO) capabilities can be a bit costly. This is
because of the data management and predictive modeling tuning requirements. However, deploying transactional TPM (plan, execute, settle, and evaluate) is just not very expensive. We know of at least four solutions that are available for under $300 per user per month…

Myth 2. Integration Issues:

This is harder to bust. The natural reaction to “integration” is to think about doing so with an ERP system. However, there are also possible integration requirements
with a free-standing TPO solution, some data warehouse where analytics
are facilitated, and with syndicated data sources. There is also the possibility that the ERP has had a lot of tinkering done to its data
tables, which can be problematic. However, we believe that the fact that the majority (52% if you extrapolate our survey data) of consumer goods companies do have a TPM solution is evidence of its potential…

Myth 3. Lack of Standardized Processes:

We do see these in the marketplace, both with large consumer goods organizations as well as small. We were also
not surprised by the 38% that lack “standardized processes.”
However, help is available. We were encouraged that our 2017 survey data showed a 16 percentage point improvement in TPx deployments receiving best practices from their software and/or services provider. That means there is an effort prior to deployment to unite the various users under the banner of consistent and improved processes. But in
cases where more work is required to arrive at a set of standard processes, there are scores of consulting firms of all sizes and geographic presences that can help. Also, the POI itself is chartered
on the idea of facilitating dialog and best practices. There is help available. It is just a matter of getting it, whether internally or with the help of a third party. Therefore, we feel that this myth is BUSTED.

Myth 4. Available
Functionality Does Not Meet Our Needs:

Finally, we were taken aback by the perception that available functionality does not meet the needs of a whopping 10 survey respondents (27%) that have some requirement that does not covered by one of the many TPM solutions. As we interact with both CG companies and vendors we simply have not come across requests for specific functionality that are not available out-of-the-box…

Other Myths:

Additionally, we captured the free text reasons from survey respondents as part of the “Other” reason category. There are some myths in there that we need to bust as well. Learn more, and access the complete document here