What does an optimised supply chain look like?
A supply chain is optimal when it achieves a perfect balance between efficiency, flexibility, quality, sustainability and risk management. This requires a willingness to continuously improve, the use of modern technologies and close cooperation between all parties involved in the supply chain.
The parties involved are the consumers or our customers, we as producers and our suppliers or the suppliers' suppliers, etc.).
For us in the Mibelle Group, this means that the Business Units, Research & Development and, within the Supply Chain & Operations Support Unit, the Planning, Order Processing, Purchasing, Production and Logistics departments must work together efficiently in order to fully meet consumer and customer requirements. This requires the ability to deal with very different market conditions, supplier capabilities and customer requirements.
How do you ensure that the different customer needs are taken into account in planning and what are the trends?
Our planning is combined end-to-end from sales to production planning in one organisational and technical system unit. This enables us to provide our various customer groups with individual and customised support. Maximum transparency and short communication channels enable quick and good decisions to be made. This is how we actively live customer centricity.
When it comes to sustainability, customers and consumers have clear expectations of us producers, be it in terms of palm oil, microplastics or the CO2 footprint. The Mibelle Group is role model in this area. The traceability of raw materials is also becoming increasingly important for customers. All these environmental issues have a major impact on purchasing, which, together with our Research & Development department and our suppliers, must constantly come up with new and innovative solutions.
What role does purchasing play in the supply chain and in product innovations?
The Mibelle Group Procurement Team is committed to purchasing goods and services in a cost-effective, reliable and innovative manner. We constantly monitor the supplier market and thus form an important link to our innovation team. Thanks to our knowledge, we can always keep our colleagues up to date with the latest technologies, active ingredients, packaging options, etc.
What happens if major supply bottlenecks suddenly occur?
In our increasingly complex world, a residual supply risk can never be completely ruled out. In such crisis situations, our dedicated, holistically-minded and specially trained employees ensure that the customer or consumer does not even notice them. We literally go the extra mile for our customers! In recent months and years, there have (unfortunately) been various situations in which we have been able to successfully demonstrate our skills.
How important is digitalisation for the supply chain?
The targeted use of the latest technologies and digitalised processes help us to work through processes in a lean and reliable manner and make the best possible use of our resources. However, systemic networking will be much stronger in the future. In the vision, artificial intelligence takes over parts of operational planning and procurement. The prerequisite for this development is flawless data quality and networking. Data governance will be the big topic in the coming years.