A Quantum Leap In Monitoring

Imagine a world where you could see everything that is going on inside your suppliers' manufacturing plants. While this might sound like something straight out of a Ray Bradbury science fiction novel, food retailers are reinforcing their presence and quality objectives to suppliers through progressive quality assurance measures.

Costs associated with major product recalls, ranging from product retrieval to legal liabilities, can be stifling and massive, requiring significant recovery time. Some companies, as attested to by recent events in the food industry, are unable to overcome the damage.

Mirror, mirror

Quality products begin with quality suppliers. Food retailers, both large and small, typically go to great lengths to cultivate and sustain relationships with suppliers having a commitment to producing safe and quality goods that mirrors their own internal standards.

Noting that even the most educated consumers rarely blame suppliers for the production of substandard store brand products, industry observers stress the importance of working with suppliers whose number-one priority is delivering quality products. When a problem occurs, they underscore, the company brand is almost always at the eye of the storm.

Generally, a number of red flags can be observed in suppliers' food management programs long before a simmering processing or contamination problem comes to light, including:

• Lack of proof that products consistently meet retailer specifications.
• Insufficient documentation of raw and finished product testing.
• Failure to conduct internal audits and inspections of manufacturing operations on a regular basis.
• Late deliveries of goods to retail facilities.
• Substandard performance in mandatory third-party audits.
• Out-of-date Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) programs.
• Poor environmental monitoring programs.
• Lack of employee training regarding quality management programs.

All too often, these and other important issues are discovered only after tainted or contaminated product has been released for public consumption.

Validation and verification

The Food Safety and Modernization Act (FSMA) has been called the most sweeping change in the country's food safety legislation in more than 60 years. The regulation places significant responsibilities on manufacturers to prevent food contamination throughout the supply chain, a departure from the country's long-held tradition, which relied on government inspectors to catch tainted food after the fact.

Under FSMA, which was passed into law in 2011, manufacturers must validate and verify that their suppliers have the requisite programs in place to properly manage and minimize food safety risks. At the same time, the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI), a retail business-driven initiative for the continuous improvement of food safety management systems, requires GFSI accredited companies to have functional and effective supplier monitoring programs in place.

Needless to say, this is a costly and time-consuming responsibility for many retailers — one that is driving scores of companies to pursue out-of-the box thinking, evaluate new strategies and embrace novel technologies.

Data rich, information poor

Short of setting up stakes in supplier plants, having real-time integrated data is the next best option for companies to monitor the ability of suppliers to meet their robust specifications.

Supplier-monitoring programs have been a vital staple of food quality assurance (QA) programs for decades. In the not-too-distant past, suppliers largely submitted required data to companies in various formats, which were then compiled into computer spreadsheets for review and analysis. Spreadsheets could be tumultuous and extremely cumbersome, making it difficult to trace data from multiple supplier locations or tell a story about the product's compliance. In addition, spreadsheets offered little or no protection against data corruption.

The ongoing availability of sophisticated multifaceted data management systems is placing invaluable supplier/product information at the fingertips of retailers. These systems allow retailers to see the "big picture" regarding supplier performance by integrating and managing data from multiple locations. These data management systems have a number of uses, including:

• Systematic monitoring for non-compliances with basic program requirements (e.g., submitting samples on a monthly basis).
• Identification of gaps and areas for improvement in meeting specifications.
• Integrated data analysis and trends reporting to identify systemic issues.
• Long-term determination of product drift on key performance parameters.
• Early warning signs with respect to process/product inconsistencies.
• Direct comparisons of suppliers and products.
• Verification of existing specifications for relevancy based on test data.

Through a "holistic" overview, cutting-edge data management systems allow retailers to understand how their suppliers and products are performing. They turn data into information and tell a story about the supplier. A retailer, for example, can track months of sample testing data from a supplier to project future performance. Generally, downward trends and deterioration are telltale signs of a problem; a sudden or abrupt change in performance metrics could point to imminent trouble ahead.

Sound data are critical to controlling product quality and managing risk. With the growing reliance on suppliers from around the world, food retailers must leverage their resources to measure and monitor supplier performance. The ongoing evolution of supplier data management systems provides them with a powerful tool in their safety and quality objectives.

Julie Wankowski is director of technical services for Silliker Inc., Chicago, and has more than 20 years of food industry experience. She can be reached at [email protected].