Food & Drink Brand Distributor
The Client
Our client is a sole distributor working with premium food and drink brand partners across a range of channels and categories, delivering to the grocery and food service sectors in the UK.
The organisation has experienced significant growth since Teed first worked with them in 2009. Since then, there is a greater dependency on maintaining the resilience of its storage and distribution network.
With several high-profile cyber security attacks and supply chain disruptions experienced in the retail industry, there are now increasing demands to be prepared for the unexpected.
The Challenge
In the light of recent cyber attacks and systems issues affecting retailers and distribution networks, the client wanted to ensure these types of disruption could be assimilated into business operations without impacting customer services.
Management acknowledged the need to refresh and exercise its business continuity arrangements although were in the midst of an IT system transition and a very busy operational period, so the business continuity project needed to be managed efficiently without causing undue pressure on managers.
Alongside was the need to review the business continuity capabilities of the client’s key third-party storage and logistics suppliers (3PLs), one of whom holds most of the stock thus representing a significant dependency.
The Solution
Teed’s consultant worked with the client’s project team to update their business continuity (BC) by first understanding the changes that had been made since implementation, both on the ground and in the cloud. Adapting our proven business impact analysis (BIA) methodology to ensure the right information was obtained from business representatives, we embarked on interviews across the business. Then followed recovery strategy and plan development discussions to source information necessary to produce a workable, concise BC plan.
We also conducted supplier BC review discussions with key 3PLs and client representatives to understand their ability to continue services to the client in the event of a disruption. Response and recovery documentation was also reviewed. Any gaps that were identified were followed up with suggested improvement actions. Teed’s supplier preparedness scoring was applied across several categories including risk, strategies, emergency management, plan testing and maintenance, providing a benchmark for the supplier reviews.
Finally, our consultant designed, facilitated and wrote up a tabletop exercise for business representatives likely to be involved in the response and recovery of operations at the time of a disruption. 11 business and technology participants joined the session onsite to consider two evolving scenarios, involving:
- Denial of access to a key 3PL site
- Unauthorised access to third-party IT provider environment causing loss of critical IT services
The exercise enabled participants to think through and communicate appropriate actions to respond effectively to the scenarios providing confidence that the BC plan and strategies were effective.
A couple of key takeaways were noted: The need to proactively work with top five retailers to pre-plan scenarios; there is further scope for developing and testing select workarounds for maintaining the most critical activities in the event of IT systems issues.
Comments received during the exercise debrief included:
“Promoted understanding of which situations would be deemed as business-critical vs standard challenges that we face day-to-day”
“Felt it was a good exercise, and you could clearly see everyone interacted but also listened so the best plan and right outcome could be achieved”
The Result
Engaging a specialist firm with experience of working in retail and logistics end-to-end business continuity projects was important to the client and their satisfaction with the project outcomes confirmed they had made the right choice in choosing Teed.
The client’s BC planning is now validated and up to date, providing confidence that the real risks have been addressed via effective plans, strategies, technology and contingencies.
Understanding the importance of supply chain management is fundamental for this type of business and carrying out supplier BC preparedness reviews is an essential part of due diligence. Equally important is keeping planning current with regular testing to keep BC capabilities and skills alive.
This was an interesting project for Teed enabling us to build on our expertise in the retail and logistics sector taking account of real-world threats and using strategic thinking to keep impacts within the minimum acceptable levels for our client.