DePaul Packaging's Food & Consumer Goods Vice President, Dean Stearman was an invited speaker at the Annual Conference of the Foundation for Strategic Sourcing (F4SS), held recently in Boston, MA, and attended by leading consumer package goods (CPG) corporations in the U.S.
The F4SS organization and its members are focused on the collaboration, innovation and standardization of best practices between CPG companies and their primary and secondary packagers.
Stearman was included in a panel discussion entitled "Value Creation Through Enabling Technologies." The multi-viewpoint panel discussed two case studies of value creation enabled by Nulogy's PackManager technology solution. DePaul Packaging, a division of DePaul Industries, is a proven leader and real time 'alpha tester' of Nulogy Corporations' PackManager operational software.
Additional panel members included Alan Weinman of Frito-Lay, Bill Floyd of Bell-Carter Packaging, and Nulogy CEO, Jason Tham. Their discussion was led by moderator Bob Heaney, Senior Research Analyst, Supply-Chain Management of Aberdeen Group.
DePaul Packaging is the leading Contract Packaging and Co-Pack facility in the Pacific Northwest. DePaul provides "Demand Driven" solutions for the consumer package goods demand chain.
Dean Stearman is a "silo-buster." From his early days of making sure advertising and promotion agencies "played well" together, to insisting that his suppliers in the demand chain collaborate to streamline and dovetail their operations to best service his brands, Dean knocks down walls to get to the core of every efficiency. He is a systemic innovator and his calling cards are transparency and collaboration. Dean also serves on the Northwest Food Processors Association/ERI board of directors.
"People and technology need to adapt to process vs. process adapting to technology," says Stearman, "Demand driven operations require adaptability, flexibility and 'real time' information accessible to all -- from planning to the production work cell to visibility for customer's access. People are the key and our focus. Ease of use is imperative."
"The 'Value Creation Through Enabling Technologies' panel discussion marked a sea change that has been a long time coming," said Dean, "and offered a peek around the corner for what needs to be done now and for the midterm." Says Dean: "The group-think in Co-Pack and Contract Packaging has gone far beyond just plain logistic considerations. It heralds the all important issue of rising trust between supplier and client. It denotes a time now when the supplier must be pro-active in forward thinking systems and anticipation of Demand Chain need. In working as a partner with clients, co-packers can virtually operate as an additional sales arm to assist their clients in selling product beyond forecast as we have."
It's this level of strategic partnering and relationship building that gives brand marketing corporations a leg up on the competition. Co-Packers, who operate at the same heightened level as DePaul Packaging does in working with Nulogy's PackManager software, and who effectively navigate the demand chain, are the ones who are ready to meet the market demands of their clients.
"This is powerful..," says Dean, "and we deliver the innovation and silo busting on so many different levels." For example, DePaul early on identified a soon to be large and looming challenge of a dearth of trained entry level workers in food and agricultural industries in Oregon and the Pacific Northwest. In response, DePaul Industries and its Staffing division as well as Food & Consumer Goods Packaging group mounted an ambitious, interlocked and forward thinking entity and training program to provide an entry level, workforce ready stable of talent to feed what will become a gaping need in the food and agricultural industries.
DePaul created and developed their HEART OF the WORKFORCE (H.O.W.) program to get ahead of the curve. This they have achieved. "Our disciplined HOW program trains our workforce in food and personal safety compliance and many other desperately needed skills. Perhaps more importantly, our HOW program instills in all candidates the absolute necessity of workplace readiness. Or, as we like to say, 'being there, when you get there.' This makes for a temporary or seasonal employee that is a definite cut above the rest." Said Dean.
The business communities in the Pacific Northwest are embracing the concept and the human output of the program with open arms. To such an extent that DePaul is now in the position of ramping up their efforts to "export" to other markets to help service similar client needs in those regions. With the HOW program a burgeoning success and the success of DePaul's other strategic initiatives on behalf of its clients, DePaul has positioned itself as a progressive Flexible Workforce solution for CPG companies both in and outside of their plants. These solutions far transcend PRICE discussion and move to creating the custom VALUE equation that results in increased sales, with powerful efficiencies in an increasingly demand driven world.