Business-to-business service levels in the supermarket sector have been under considerable pressure as a result of Covid-19 and supply chain challenges, but business and people resilience has been impressive, according to Scott Birley of specialist research company Coalface Consulting.
Coalface’s annual survey of the supermarket stores sector shows supplier service levels, in general, have slightly declined this year. That is in the context of considerable staffing challenges for both retailers and suppliers related to illnesses, stock and supply chain disruptions, putting pressure on teams tasked with keeping shelves stocked.
“It’s understandably been hard to offer a consistent, reliable service to stores, but at the same time, those who’ve adapted best have made gains,” said Birley.
Each year, Coalface scores and ranks suppliers and retailers against a range of measures, including Business partnership, reviews and insights, reliability, merchandising, planning, communication, problem solving and overall customer/supplier satisfaction.
This year’s top three ranked suppliers are Mondelēz New Zealand, Twin Agencies and Cookie Time. It was Mondelēz’s first year in the number one spot after being number two last year.
Mondelēz’ New Zealand is the custodian of brands including Cadbury, Pascall, Toblerone, The Natural Confectionery Company, Sour Patch, Green & Black’s, Philadelphia, Oreo and belVita breakfast biscuits.
Senior Manager, Sales Operations at Mondelēz Kerri Morgan has said taking out the top spot is a culmination of her team's hard work over the last few years.
“Each year, we review our performance in the Coalface survey and look at what we can do to continuously improve how we support our retail partners, increasing our satisfaction levels every year since 2017.
“I am immensely proud of the entire Mondelēz team. They are such a passionate and dedicated group of people who commit to doing their best for their customers and Mondelēz each and every day. I am delighted that our retail partners have recognised these efforts with their feedback.”
The Coalface Supermarket Stores programme is supported by all the supermarket major retailers and has been going since 2001 as an independent and objective benchmark, measuring service levels by suppliers in store. It is an incredibly trusted programme used by most of the top FMCG businesses in New Zealand.
Coalface conducts the survey independently with the support of all the main grocery retailers.
Emails are sent to stores with survey links requesting department heads (Food and Beverage, Non-Food, Bread, Milk, Liquor, Chilled, Frozen, Butchery, Deli, etc) to select the suppliers they look after and complete the survey. With well over 90 percent of stores completing the survey every year, it is an industry-leading accepted program, supported by most of the top FMCG companies in New Zealand, who integrate their performance into their business measurements and individual’s performance within any sales KPI’s.
