THE RIGHT BREW
THE RIGHT BREW Written by Nell Walker Produced by Richard Durrant
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Simon King, CPO of Tata Global Beverages – the global drinks division of Tata Group – describes the company’s procurement and logistics overhaul, and the brand explosion
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T
ata Group, since its inception in 1868, has become one of India’s largest multinational conglomerate holding companies, ever-developing founder Jamsetji Tata’s 148-year-old vision. Tata Global Beverages has been a part of the group since 1960, and has seen some of the industry’s most significant drink innovations within its company umbrella. Global Beverages is a tea, coffee, and water company, which counts Tata Tea, Tetley, Teapigs, and Eight O’Clock Coffee as some of its biggest brands. Around 250 million servings of its products are consumed every day, with a strong brand presence in over 40 countries. Simon King, CPO of Tata Global Beverages, describes the impact of huge global trademarks such as these: “Tata Tea is enormous in India, as is Tetley in the UK and Canada. We have joint
ventures in the US and in South Africa. Business in the Middle East is growing quite rapidly. It’s grown largely by acquisition over a period of years, and total revenues are about $1.5 billion including joint ventures.” Each brand within Tata Group operates independently, and Global Beverages is currently undergoing a procurement transformation headed by King himself: “Previously, each of the brands in each of the countries had looked after their own packagingbuying under each of the individual functions within them. We’re now setting up the global procurement approach so we can look at how we deliver improved value to Global Beverages by working with fewer, better suppliers. Now we’re only interacting with suppliers who are able to support our business objectives and growth plans, rather
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than just whoever happened to business.” have been used historically.” This standardised method The company’s procurement of operation has ensured that overhaul includes a heavy Global Beverages maintains focus on putting in place the great communication with both right people, the right structure, stakeholder and consumer groups. and the right approach to It allows the company to logistics: “What we’ve got discover and establish is a regionally-placed best practice within each but category-led region, and implement matrix structure,” King it wherever appropriate. explains. “There are So how does King teams placed in each manage a supply chain of our geographies, of Global Beverages’s and each one has a scale? head of procurement. “Because it wasn’t Every other member attempted before this Staff are employed of each team will also overhaul, we hadn’t by Tata Global take a global lead been able to test it,” he Beverages in a particular area explains. “First we had of spend; a head of to look at establishing logistics, a head of marketing, of exactly what we spend. How packaging, and so on. That way much? On what? With whom? we can drive a standard strategy What are the contractual positions? and way of operating across our We’re in the process of putting in
3,000
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SIMON KING, CPO
place a standard spend analytics tool across all of the countries, so they’ll be able to take feeds from all the ERP systems and feed that into our own tool. “So where is the business going in each category? What do our stakeholders need from their suppliers and their supply chains? We use the knowledge of different teams to measure how we should actually be going about sourcing in
that particular area, so that spend is as effective as possible. Then we know what is going on in the broader marketplace. It’s important to liaise with the teams on what we should be doing to optimise that spend and deliver sustainable value to the business.” The company has a three year plan in place at every step of the supply chain, ensuring its methods are optimised by 2019: “Quarter
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one is about understanding and pivot tables, negotiating with and updating knowledge of our potential lenders to put the new processes and the requirements of spend analysis tool in place. the market,” says King. “Quarter “We’re also putting a central two is about refreshing the contract management tool three year plan, quarter in place,” King says, three is about taking “because it’s very the first year of the difficult to keep on plan, turning it track when there into the annual are multiple business plan legal entities and getting it and multiple Tata Global aligned with the geographies Beverages products business, and involved, so are consumed daily quarter four is for this will allow focussing on those us to have all our initiatives and making standard terms and sure we deliver them.” conditions held on that Global Beverages is in the process system, with the ability to edit as of perfecting the business-wide required. ERP systems which will streamline “All of this is automatic and can be the company yet further. King is in built into our three year planning the final stages of switching from process. There’s no way we can outdated Excel spreadsheets keep a tab on our contracts without
250 million
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“ We’re only interacting with suppliers who are able to support our business objectives and growth plans ”
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a management tool, and much of the Tata Group is owned by charitable trusts, so we need to maintain that ethical focus with these new IT processes.” Tata’s strong sense of ethics extends throughout its operations, with a code of conduct that suppliers and 3,000-strong employee base alike are expected to adhere to, ensuring only the best and most dedicated team: “In India particularly Tata is a hugely powerful brand, and people are delighted and proud to work within the group,” says King. “They understand the ethical element and what it stands for. It’s a huge part of what impresses people about the business, and it’s one of the reasons I joined, as well as the charitable element, the great work Tata does, and the strength of the brand. “There isn’t the same level of awareness globally as there is in India, and I’m doing my small part to raise that awareness because I think it’s a genuinely impressive organisation with lots of fantastic ideals. Lots of businesses talk about values but it’s not always as embedded as it is for us. Tata Group lives up to its values.”
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