Sales & Value Chain Management

Our experts have gained their experience in either retail, the trade from business to consumers or in wholesale, the trade between businesses. Both industries have changed tremendously in the past decennia for example by being trendsetters in online sales and services and the need to implement many new European regulations regarding products.

The retail industry is quite a complex affair. Consumers’ decisions to buy or not to buy depend on subjective, psychological factors and are much less rational than, for instance, purchases made by businesses. The Netherlands is home to some very successful retail chains, be it food, or non- food. The Dutch chains, HEMA and Action, each operate over five hundred stores in addition to branches in various European markets.

The wholesale sector, or B-to-B, has increased in importance by improving the distribution function in a number of sectors following the online order process. Retailers have decreased their stock levels and sometimes even outsourced their entire supply chain management. The Netherlands is a distribution country with considerable knowledge and experience in the fields of Supply Chain Management and Quality Control. Our PUM experts can provide advice on how to improve your (logistic) processes, strategic stock planning and warehousing, how to expand your supply chain services (product/market combinations) and how to improve your profitability.

Areas of expertise

• Business processes: quick scan of current processes and advice on how to optimize and/or reengineer;
• Organisational development: quick scan of current organisation and advice on how to devide tasks, authorities and responsibilities; plus advice on internal communication (meetings, frequency, agenda, attendants; bilaterals etc);
• How to approach succession issues?
• Analysing available data (financial figures, production figures, stock figures) and translating them into clear and informative steering information;
• Writing a business plan, including Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threads of the company (SWOT- analysis), resulting in a concrete action plan.
• Buying and supplychain (incl stock management-issues)
• Creating a marketing plan, including what to promote when (sales calendar)?, what kind of activities, events and content?, off line or online media?
• E-commerce, online business, content of webshop, protocol for backoffice processes like ordering and delivery.
• Training and education of commercial staff members (salesforce, marketing) on customer focus and operational excellence.

Client examples

Sub wholesale company in fresh fruit and vegetables

The client distributes fresh produce from local producers as well as imported goods. While business was expanding the client wanted to improve the distribution chain and provide better services to customers and to cut down on waste due to poor handling of farm produce from the farm; increase sales and profit.

Together with the team the PUM expert created a SWOT analysis. The strength of the company turned out to be good relations with the supermarkets (customer intimacy) because of good customer focus of the management. The weakness was a relatively poor consistency of deliveries of the farmers/producers. After consultation with the competition, i.e 3 other main wholesalers in the area, they decided to sit together with the producers to make better planning of sowing and harvesting. This way the whole supplychain (producer, wholesaler, retailer) can avoid that all farmers harvest the same products at the same market moment, which improves possibilities to keep margins healthy and to reduce waste.

Retailer personal awards

The client asked for support to create a marketing and sales plan. The PUM expert held workshops every morning with a taskforce consisting of people from Sales and Marketing to gather ideas and make a on/offline marketing year plan. Same client asked for a follow-up mission to get help in organising the buying process and stock management. Together with the team the PUM expert developed a set of management reports which gives good insight on stock positions and helps to improve sales forecast. To evaluate sense and nonsense of the assortment the PUM expert organised a day-long meeting with all people involved (sales, marketing, purchasing, stock control) and together they decided the assortment could be reduced by more than 20% of the stock keeping units. And to reduce stock shrinkage we improved overview and control of physical stock by implementing a location system in the warehouse.

Strategic advice for wholesale company

The client asked for strategic advice on marketing and sales. To increase their revenues and profit they were planning to start business in neighbouring countries. After interviews and analysing existing data the PUM expert advised to let go of the export idea and to first expand the business in the home market (Indonesia) which is huge and has great potential. Furthermore the home market is easier to understand and to control. To increase revenues more structure and more power on the sales efforts was needed. Therefore the PUM expert produced a sheet ‘Activity Planning Sales Force’. Next they transferred some employees from Marketing (which had too many people) to Sales (not enough people). After training the new collegues the sales department was able to be much more productive without hiring extra people in the company.

Training of NGO employees

A Fair Trade Organisation introduced a new income generating programme for economically disadvantaged women aiming at growing export of woven/knitted items. Work plan for this project:

1. Training of employees responsible for the export /orders on customer relations, communication and order processing;
2. Provide training about preparation, planning and quality management;
3. Provide training about responsibilities, tasks and planning. Create more awareness in the organisation of management responsibilities.
4. Re-adjust the order system: checking what is working well and what parts/departments need attention;
5. Solve bottlenecks between the departments and introduce helpful administration (per order).

Professional people for positive impact

Looking to grow your business or organisation sustainably and build a brighter future for your community? Contact one of our representatives in your country for criteria, more information and guidance on the application process.