Food For Thought: Improving Food Manufacturer & Retailer Teamwork In A Recall (Part One Of Three)

By Sam Lewis, editor, Food Online; Alicia Sims-Miller, reverse logistics and business integration manager, PepsiCo; and Kim Combs, recall/regulatory compliance manager, The Kroger Company

On Tuesday, October 11, Grocery Manufacturers Association (GMA) and the Food Marketing Institute (FMI) partnered with Food Online for a live web chat, Food For Thought: Improving Food Manufacturer & Retailer Teamwork In A Recall. In this 45-minute live Q&A, Kim Combs, recall/regulatory compliance manager for The Kroger Co and Alicia Sims-Miller, manager of the reverse logistics and business integration teams for PepsiCo’s North American Nutrition Division joined Food Online’s editor Sam Lewis to answer the food industry’s questions on the topic.

Sam Lewis, editor, Food Online: Hey, everyone, and thank you for attending today's web chat. My name is Sam Lewis. I'm the editor of Food Online; I'll be your moderator for today's edition of Food for Thought: Improving Food Manufacturer and Retailer Teamwork in a Recall. I'd like to thank the Grocery Manufacturer's Association (GMA) and the Food Marketing Institute (FMI) for partnering with Food Online and providing us with excellent subject matter experts on this important and timely topic. And thank you attendees for joining us.

We're expecting today's presentation to take about 45 minutes. Most of that time will be dedicated to answering your direct questions. Feel free to submit your questions at any time during our session. Before we begin, I'd like to take a few moments to tell you a little bit about Food Online and then introduce you to our subject matter experts.

FoodOnline.com is an online community of food industry professionals, striving to advance the production of safe and healthy food and beverages. We provide best practices and solutions in food safety, product inspection, food manufacturing and processing, food packaging and equipment, automation, robotics, and the supply chain.

Now it's my pleasure to introduce to you our subject matter experts. Alicia Sims Miller, manager of the reverse logistics and business integration teams for PepsiCo's North America Nutrition Division, and Kim Combs, recall regulatory compliance manager for The Kroger Company. Welcome aboard, Alicia and Kim.

Alicia's team acts as the liaisons and decision makers for business activities such as new product introductions, palette reconfigurations, [inaudible 00:01:55] and recalls, customer returns, and freight claims. She has 16 years of Quaker Oats/PepsiCo experience and throughout her tenure at PepsiCo Chicago, she's held numerous positions in customer supply chain, strategy, and logistics. Alicia has been a key player for several business integrations, such as Tropicana and Frito Lay brand cookies, as well as the system integration of SAP. Again, Alicia, thanks for being with us.

Alicia Sims-Miller, reverse logistics and business integration manager, PepsiCo: Thank you for having me today, Sam.

Sam: Our next subject matter expert is Kim Combs. She is the recall regulatory compliance manager for The Kroger Company. She has been in this position in 2012, with her primary focus being directing vendor partners and managing the communication of product recalls for The Kroger Enterprise. These recall notices have the potential to affect the lives of 8.5 million customers, and 431,000 associates, who shop or serve in Kroger's nearly 2,800 retail stores. Kim's recall communication encompasses 38 production plants and a network of over 40 warehouses. Additionally, Kim manages Kroger's USDA country of origin labeling (COOL) audit program for its retail stores. Kim, thanks for joining us.

Kim Combs, recall/regulatory compliance manager, The Kroger Company: Thanks for taking the time to talk about recalls today.

Sam: It's great to have both of you with us. Here's what we have in store for today. Our goal is to provide you with information and best practices to improve communication and procedures between food manufacturers and food retailers during a crisis scenario such as a recall. Most importantly, we'll spend much of our time addressing and answering your questions. Again, feel free to submit them at any point during our chat.

Let's get the ball rolling. Kim, can you give us the 30,000-foot view of the food manufacturer, food retailer relationship, and some of the unique challenges and opportunities the industry is facing?

Kim: Absolutely. One of the things that's unique in my position is I get to deal with recalls every day of my job, where manufacturers certainly don't ever want to deal with them. We live in an environment today where manufacturers must accept that recalls will occur. It is not a matter of if, but when a recall will occur at your facility. It may not be something that is the fault of the manufacturer, but a lot of times, it's an ingredient or a packaging issue that might come into you. Manufacturers just need to be aware. Even those starting from the ground up on day one of production that a recall is a real even that will occur sometime in the life of their production.

All manufacturers must have a plan for executing those recalls and managing the consumer questions and perceptions regarding those recalls. Also, when you're a manufacturer in a recall environment, they need to realize that retailers need accurate information and that they have to take a step back and make sure that they review all of the information before it goes out. That's code dates, the location where products are shipped.

In this day and age, news about recalls travels very quickly via social media, mobile phones, news alerts, and other channels. If you look back at history, 10 to 15 years ago, we were tuning in to the nightly news to get announcements on recalls. Well, that gave manufacturers time to get things under control, and it gave retailers time to get products pulled off our shelves. Now, when a press release goes out, that pop-up message is appearing on everybody's phones. Our consumers are asking questions right away. That's something to keep in mind.

As a manufacturer, you want to be in control of the recall situation to the best of your abilities. The retailers need to be prepared to handle the removal of products quickly and accurately. We really rely on the accurate communication that comes from the manufacturers. Also, as a manufacturer, you need to consider a recall from the perspective of the consumer and of the store associate that is identifying and filling the product.

If a manufacturer has put together a recall notice that is so complicated, it takes high-level scientists to sort through what the situation is, there's a really good chance that our associates and our customers are going to have difficulties interpreting that. I just encourage everybody to just slow down, take a breath, before spitting out information, and just look at those notices from different perspectives than what you are used to with your knowledge of the product, and the discussions that you have around the conference tables and your manufacturing plant. That's a little bit of just know that they will occur, and do your best to communicate the accurate information to consumers and retailers.

Sam: Alicia, do you have anything to add to Kim's points?

Alicia: Kim made very good points. I just wanted to touch base on how you can address those concerns that will come from a retailer. One thing is conducting mock recall sessions. Those sessions will allow you to prepare. As Kim stated, a recall is going to happen. It's just identifying at what time it will happen. Doing a mock recall session will allow you to prepare for when an actual recall occurs.

Another thing is post-recall sessions. Having those sessions after a recall to allow you to come to the table and understand what went well and possibly what opportunity areas we can work on so that you're better prepared for a recall. Another thing is having a play book in place in order to help you execute a recall. That's very helpful. Also, identifying what we call a core crisis team. Understand when it comes to a recall, there are many players that are responsible for making it happen. Having those players identified before a recall is helpful, so that when it's time to get that accurate, timely information, to our retailers, we can do that.

You want to make sure you understand that when you are announcing a recall that you have to make sure you can communicate at the warehouse level, the store level, and at the consumer level. Also, when it comes to communications, you want to make sure you have communications that are going to go out to your customers, which are your retailers, and you want to make sure that you are hitting all levels, as well as you have to understand the consumers and press releases. You also need to make sure you have a team that is monitoring social media and understanding what are we hearing out on those types of vehicles as it relates to recalls.

I think Kim hit every point that is important. I think it's important that manufacturers can actually address everything that Kim is saying. If you're prepared for them and accept that a recall is going to occur, then you should be able to give your retailers what they need when you have to announce a recall.

Sam: There are certainly a lot to take in. One of the big things that I heard from Alicia was mock recalls. Just a little shameless plug, one of our first Food for Thought sessions was about mock recalls and best practices for performing them. If you didn't check that session out, feel free to search that term on Food Online, and you can get loads of content based around the chat we had there. Thank you both for getting the ball rolling.

Let's get to the big portion of our chat. Questions have been pouring in and we'd like to start addressing them. We'll try to answer as many questions as possible in the time we have remaining. If you haven't yet submitted a question, feel free to do so.

First one, I'm going to get both of your perspectives. Alicia, if you'd like to lead off, here it is: There's some confusion about effectiveness checks, such as confirming that consignees receive a recall notice and responded. If you are connecting with a consignee directly and immediately, confirming a receipt and response, further checks should not be needed. What are your thoughts on that? Do you agree? Do you disagree? Why?

Alicia: I want to make sure I understand the question. We're reaching out to a consignee regarding a recall. I'll play it out in this world. You want to make sure that you communicate effectively at every level. You want to make sure, and this is the best way of monitoring is, is doing some form of tracker. Eventually you're going to have to share this information out with the FDA of who you spoke, so definitely, what level of retailer it might be, you want to track and make sure you properly communicated, that they acknowledge the communication, and then you want to also be able to track the cases. It may be where we're reaching out to someone daily until we can resolve every case may be that is part of a recall.

Sam: Kim, do you have any thoughts to add?

Kim: I think Alicia did a great job answering that from a manufacturing standpoint. From a retailer standpoint, I think one of the things to keep in mind is, obviously, you want to be in contact with someone at the company, and have confirmation that they have received the recall notice, and that the recall notice has been issued to the specific stores or affected warehouses. If there are questions, feel free to follow up with retailers.

One thing to keep in mind is that retailers are experiencing multiple recalls a day. As a manufacturer, you may not feel you are getting all the attention you may want for your specific recall. Usually that's just because of the queue that this recall notice has fallen. If you do have any questions or concerns as far as the effectiveness checks go, feel free to just be in contact with that specific retailer.

In Part Two of Food For Thought: Improving Food Manufacturer & Retailer Teamwork In A Recall, Kim Combs and Alicia Sims-Miller will continue answering questions from the web chat’s live audience. Stay tuned.