Jul 27, 2016

By: Sarah Malenich, Senior Manager for Sales & Marketing, Safe Quality Food Institute
Mission Impossible

Today’s shoppers want to buy from local growers and, whenever possible, know the source of the ingredients in their processed food. For food retailers and companies looking to respond to this consumer demand for healthy, locally sourced food, the task of providing the information about where the food you’re selling in the grocery aisles comes from might seem impossible, but I promise you it’s not.

It’s true, buying from local growers can present many challenges and risks to a food company’s supplier approval program. It might seem at times to be as complicated as Tom Cruise trying to steal a top secret list from the heart of the CIA. But the truth is, for a program to be successful clear, easy and fast communication across hundreds of growers and several decision makers is the game changer. By that I mean:

  • Growers must be able to easily and quickly communicate information about Quality Systems Compliance (sanitation, HACCP, recall system, environmental monitoring, GAP, regulatory compliance, letters of insurance, letters of guarantee and returned goods policy, to name a few), product availability, quantity, quality and price to buyers;  
  • Quality Assurance or Food Safety team members need to be able to see the required information anytime, anywhere, and respond quickly for approval; and
  • Negotiations between procurement teams and growers need to be captured, analyzed and presented in an easy to understand format that can be tracked and traced.
Simple! Right? That’s where the Safe Quality Food Institute comes in. Join the SQFI team and Gina R. (Nicholson) Kramer, Executive Director, Savour Food Safety International, in our Free Learning Lunch on Wednesday July 27, 2016 at 12:00 pm ET, as we discuss how to work directly with local growers and learn simple and quality system compliance measures that the local grower can achieve to turn mission impossible into mission accomplished.  Register online. 

Photo Credit: TNS Sofres