Cheese Market Procurement Intelligence Report

Business practices within Cheese market are heavily influenced by changing trends across the category as well as within the broader Food and Beverages market. The category has historically lagged in tech adoption due to inadequate skillsets of majority of workforce and the perennial requirement to reduce facilities related cost. Therefore, suppliers who have demonstrated technological prowess to achieve efficiencies are being preferred over traditional vendors.

Several macro level trends such as slowing economic growth, trade conflicts, rising wages and technological disruptions have put pressure on managers to reduce their spend on Cheese without affecting the performance.

A balanced approach to procurement of Cheese has emerged, where buyers with multiple locations first outsource at individual locations and gradually move to standardize and consolidate the services across facilities.

As a result, category managers need to closely monitor the Cheese procurement trends and identify changes required in their procurement environment for the category.

It has become imperative for category managers to remain as agile as possible in terms of their procurement practices. However, it is not always easy to quickly spot and implement alternative practices in a category like Cheese. To help quick decision making, this report advises on several procurement best practices that have worked well for category managers.

For example, Buyers must ensure the participation and collaboration of all related cross-functional teams (procurement, electrical, engineering, and housekeeping) in category management and planning activities. This is crucial, as these teams will be the primary end-users of the services offered by suppliers, and this step will ensure consistency in services.

Buyers should evaluate the true costs of each product and service within the scope of work for supplier, and also understand the hidden costs associated. This can help them to set accurate targets for cost reduction for their suppliers, and effectively monitor and evaluate their performance against industry benchmarks.

Buyers should set a baseline against which the performance of suppliers can be benchmarked along with setting measurable/quantifiable KPIs. Defined KPIs provides suppliers with clarity on the scope. Besides setting standards for operations, pricing, and performance, KPIs must provide tangible goals in terms of the quality of solutions.

Cheese procurement managers also need to proactively identify and mitigate potential risks that can arise in the supply chain or contracts for Cheese procurement. Some examples include: