By Matt Smith, icix
It seems like every week recently we hear about cars being recalled, baby seats failing safety tests and food items being deemed dangerous by some health organization.
Retailers need to keep track not only of the recalls but of the documentation that ensures them that the rest of their product selection is safe — both guaranteed by their suppliers and validated by a third-party lab. When retailers don’t keep track of these documents, bad things can happen very quickly.
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Dr. David Acheson, former Chief Medical Officer at the USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service and CEO of the Acheson Group, a food safety consultancy, recently wrote about the increasingly litigious nature of the food and drug safety issue. The column is an account of the legal fall-out of the Jensen Farms case in Colorado, where an outbreak of Listeria in cantaloupe caused the deaths of several people and the infection of more than 150 more. Because the grower went bankrupt within days of the outbreak, lawyers went after the companies that sold the disease-ridden cantaloupe — retailers. Now those retailers are settling with the plaintiffs.
Perhaps the most salient point in Dr. Acheson’s blog is the last paragraph:
“A precedent has been set, and it is a precedent of which every link in the supply chain needs to be aware, with the understanding that liability for an outbreak can hit anywhere and everywhere. To me this case illustrates that if you are a part of the supply chain, you hold a part of the responsibility — and the liability. So the key question is how much and what you can do to reduce that liability?”
See the entire blog here.
This isn’t a horror movie that has a hero at the end to save the day. This is real life, complete with tragedy that kills people and ruins companies. The good news is that it’s preventable. Technology and best practices exist to help companies not only prevent most outbreaks but quickly limit the damage when they occur.
For years, decades really, retailers relied on paper-based systems to track the details of safety tests conducted on incoming products. Children’s apparel items coming from Asia had fire test information that hopefully arrived by mail about the same time. Small appliances from Mexico had paperwork faxed from a third-party lab. Even products from major food manufacturers often had test information included with each shipment.
While many suppliers have moved beyond physical mail and faxes to email, and retailers are often using a spreadsheet to keep track of the documentation, companies need an efficient, centralized way to track status and monitor their supply chain. During the past few years, solutions have come into the market to address these issues, some focusing on specific categories and others looking at the broader market.
The new technology solutions are designed to help retailers and their trading partners keep customers safe. They are also designed to help keep these companies in business and out of court. That last line of Dr. Acheson’s blog is worth repeating: “So the key question is how much and what you can do to reduce that liability?”
Matt Smith is the Co-Founder and Chief Strategy Officer of icix, which helps many of the world’s largest companies manage risk across their global supply chains.
