2014 Awards Winners: Dick Clark Supply Chain Award

This award is presented to a consumer goods firm for excellence in executing improvements in supply or demand planning, warehouse management, transportation management, S&OP processes or supply chain network design.

WINNER
The Kellogg Company

The 2014 Dick Clark Supply Chain Award honors Kellogg Company for its successful integration of the $2.7 billion-dollar Pringles acquisition — the second largest acquisition in the company’s storied history.

“Those of you who have ever integrated two companies together know how complex and stressful it can be,” said Jack Hagist, vice president, Kellogg Company, during a special awards ceremony at CGT’s 2014 Consumer Goods Business & Technology Leadership Conference. “Getting dozens, sometimes hundreds of disparate systems to talk to each other — and doing so quickly — to ensure that customers can continue to order our product during the transition is no easy feat.”

But, as American composer Leonard Bernstein said, “To achieve great things, two things are needed; a plan, and not quite enough time.” That was certainly the case with Pringles, which despite challenging deadlines, delivered process and application integration in one month, under budget and, most importantly, without losing a single can of Pringles production.

Kellogg Company Chief Executive Officer John Bryant referred to integration, which commenced return on investment in 12 months, as “flawless”.

What’s more, the brand new category is the largest growth driver in the Kellogg portfolio, delivering double-digit growth globally in the first year. To its credit, it also enabled a fully automated warehousing and distribution solution for the newly acquired category products, and enabled the commissioning and operation of a new manufacturing and distribution facility in Eastern Europe.

“As you can imagine, this was massive undertaking involving a large team of dedicated, committed, passionate Kellogg employees, in IT, supply chain and in many other business functions throughout the company, who had to come together and work as a team to pull this off,” closed Hagist.

FINALISTS
Avon Products, Inc.
To enable collaborative planning and execution processes with its suppliers, Avon Products Inc. developed a revolutionary supply chain solution with E2Open called, “Connect2Avon.” By providing seamless integration with backend systems, regardless of type and location, it provides a single source of information for the Avon organization at large. Connect2Avon ensures an accurate picture of inventory related to any stage of the product’s lifecycle.

Campbell Soup Company
Following a recent implementation of SAP APO tools for supply chain management, Campbell Soup upgraded to Terra Technology’s Demand Sensing 5.0. The technology allows Campbell make supply decisions using forecasts reflecting current market realities rather than historical estimates. Better forecast accuracy will further its efforts to improve customer service, without the burden of carrying unnecessary inventory.