Tesco's and Suppliers relationship

UK PROFESSIONAL DRIVERS FORUMS THE UK PROFESSIONAL DRIVERS FORUM (INTERACTIVE)
21

As i think I have admitted to on here before for 10 years from 96 to 06 I was an account manager/controller for a number of food manufacturers. Job involved managing the sales to retailers. Sold to em all tesco asda js … safeway somerfield kwiksave … remember them.

This program doesn’t even scratch the surface of what has been and will be going on. I left the job due to the constant beatings, i was paid to negotiate deals and was constantly dictated to buy retailers with too much power.

The basic truth is the government has let them get too big at one stage tesco was touching 30% market share, it’s anti competitive. Name another industry where this has been allowed to happen.

Supplier payments is a massive area. They want money for everything. Just a listing for a product can cost £40k. Buyers have margin and other income (read bung) targets to hit that increase very year to satisfy shareholders. Prices have to be driven down while margins have to go up. two things suffer suppliers and product quality.

I have been involved in what has happened at Tesco more times than i care to remember. Comapny (in this case Tesco) has a poor year, all major suppliers get invites to attend a review meeting. When you get to head office all your competitors are in reception too. You get hauled in one by one to be given the news on whatever the scam is, dressed up as some form of opportunity. Basic is if you want to maintain your business it is going to cost you more, and we need the money now based on future sales. Say no and we will damage you … remeber they ahve 30% of the market its a big threat. What has happened this time is obviously some suppliers have got to the point where there is nowhere to go but out of business. The buyers have booked the money anyway and cant deliver it.

This is the tip of the iceberg, if tesco have got to the point where they are short there will also be loads of advance payments that will have to be worked out of the system. This is what caused the demise of kwiksave and then somerfield. It is OK hen your business is growing but quickly becomes a problem when it doesn’t. The other big 4 retailers will follow suit with similer warnings … or big falls in profits as they take the hit and avoid the scandal.

When i quit the job my mum used to tell me to get in touch with panorama and become a whistleblower…

22

rob22888:

Winseer:
I’m sure that if ALL supermarkets flogged off their excess perishable stock at the end of each day - There would be no need for “food banks”, and the Supermarkets would get that warm feeling of “having put something back” into society.

As someone who pays little attention to use by dates, If I knew that if I went into my local Tesco Express late in the evening there would be a wide range of decent goods at bargain prices, I’d never bother going to buy perishable stuff at full price. And i’m someone who earns a decent living. The more people that do that, the more stuff they will end up having to reduce.

From a business point of view, that’s not great is it? What they should do is get their stock controls in order.

I’m not a great fan of Tesco but most of their food waste is put into cages and taken back to RSU to be taken elsewhere and sold off.
The bakery waste for instance is put into sealed pink bags and sold off to be ground down into animal feed for dairy/beef cattle. :wink:

23

Friend of mine supplies a supermarket with maintenance gear.
Was told he had to pay a premium to supply the brand. So said fine how much. As we need to retender.
Did his new quote and added the premium to the amount (think he loaded it by 10%).
He got the job after they whinged at his increase in costs. But as he told them his overheads had gone up.

24

I don’t understand how people are so naive. It’s how the world works.

In a previous life we served a top catering company. We had to supply our invoice to their customer as they told them it was cost price. However we had to inflate invoice by 20% and give them back 15% off invoice and pay 5% into another account. If we didn’t contract was withdrawn.

25

A supermarket also told an Apple farmer that if he wanted to keep supplying them he had to line his shed with stainless. It was going to cost thousands. He asked if they would sign a term contract to ensure he wasn’t wasting his money. They wouldnyv

26

Big Truck:
I’m not a great fan of Tesco but most of their food waste is put into cages and taken back to RSU to be taken elsewhere and sold off.
The bakery waste for instance is put into sealed pink bags and sold off to be ground down into animal feed for dairy/beef cattle. :wink:

Things like this get overlooked my Joe Public though, they are just a big nasty supermarket who do no good. Some Tesco stores have in the past donated bakery waste, but knocked it on the head when they received complaints over the quality of the stuff :unamused:

Find it strange also how the other big supermarkets seem to get away scot free in terms of criticism, when they are all really up to the same tricks.

27

Thing is the big 4 are squeezing suppliers but aldi & lidl save money by getting drivers to do warehouse work & saving laying for lads to tip trailers,they also sell a lot of cheap foreign stuff brought in on foreign trucks who then take a bit of work off a british haulier.

No supermarkets have any morals and I suppose the only way round giving them your money is to go round your local shops and markets.

28

at my local tesco the manager has his own personal slave. i caught her buttering his toast

29

corij:
at my local tesco the manager has his own personal slave. i caught her buttering his toast

Yeah, but he puts mayo on her ham sandwich.

30

rob22888:

Big Truck:
I’m not a great fan of Tesco but most of their food waste is put into cages and taken back to RSU to be taken elsewhere and sold off.
The bakery waste for instance is put into sealed pink bags and sold off to be ground down into animal feed for dairy/beef cattle. :wink:

Things like this get overlooked my Joe Public though, they are just a big nasty supermarket who do no good. Some Tesco stores have in the past donated bakery waste, but knocked it on the head when they received complaints over the quality of the stuff :unamused:

Find it strange also how the other big supermarkets seem to get away scot free in terms of criticism, when they are all really up to the same tricks.

The irony is the supermarket that gets kicked the most is the one that does more than the others put together in terms of re-distributing food and recycling,very liitle goes to landfill why is it those who have never worked for a particular company seem to know the most? foodcollection.tesco.com/together
These companies exist to make money, in time honoured British tradition we love to kick a winner. Scroll down the page and click on the surplus food distribution tab.

31

mike68:

rob22888:

Big Truck:
I’m not a great fan of Tesco but most of their food waste is put into cages and taken back to RSU to be taken elsewhere and sold off.
The bakery waste for instance is put into sealed pink bags and sold off to be ground down into animal feed for dairy/beef cattle. :wink:

Things like this get overlooked my Joe Public though, they are just a big nasty supermarket who do no good. Some Tesco stores have in the past donated bakery waste, but knocked it on the head when they received complaints over the quality of the stuff :unamused:

Find it strange also how the other big supermarkets seem to get away scot free in terms of criticism, when they are all really up to the same tricks.

The irony is the supermarket that gets kicked the most is the one that does more than the others put together in terms of re-distributing food and recycling,very liitle goes to landfill why is it those who have never worked for a particular company seem to know the most? foodcollection.tesco.com/together
These companies exist to make money, in time honoured British tradition we love to kick a winner. Scroll down the page and click on the surplus food distribution tab.

More than the others put together?
Big statement.
Any hard facts to back that up?

32

Perhaps we should concentrate on changing the laws - so that firms cannot be sued for selling stuff on the cheap that “may be already gone”.

I’ve brought bread for toasting before, that when I got it home had some small mould points on some of the slices. You pick them off, and carry on FFS. I’m not complaining when I’ve bought 3 loaves for 10p…

The same applies to the NHS. It wouldn’t be losing money hand over fist like it does if all “preference” treatment (like ■■■ changes, plastic surgery, “too posh to push” caesarian sections etc) landed one with a bill, such as in America, leaving the main NHS free to save lives without worrying about “if the punter can afford it”.
Already in this country - the standards in places like Colchester, Stafford, and even my local Medway Maritime - have fallen below even the “Mercy” hospital system in America. This, all whilst being newly decorated, and with seemingly endless amounts of clerical staff plodding about, where you can’t find an actual doctor or ranking nurse for love or money. :frowning:

It ain’t right that a few “tourists” can get expensive treatment from day one, whilst someone’s mum gets left on a trolly to die quietly - because there’s not enough staff, and expensive treatments around to save her life. :imp:

We all pay national insurance contributions on our wages - and at the lower end, these NICS are more than the taxes. I was always led to understand that it is THIS money that “pays for the NHS”.
Well, those of us paying NICs just ain’t getting what we pay for. Scapping it, and starting again with an personal insurance based health system seems like a good idea to me. We’d all get BUPA like treatment for around the same cost as NICs now, especially if the higher earners can’t offset the NIC liability away with dodgy accountancy as they do. :angry:

Some heavy charges should be made to stick supermarket food in any kind of RSU. They’ve obviously not worried about “wasting” the food - so let’s make 'em “waste” some of their own cash as well - since they wanna be such tightwads, and not price it up at 9p…

Even Morrisons don’t do this with all their perishable produce. The “reduced” section never seems to have much on it, compared to the size of the shop.
My local Morrisons is in Strood, and it’s mental on the roads around there, but not really in the store itself. Mind you, these regular closures of Knight Road and Darnley Arches have not been helping of late. :bulb:

33

graeme1970:
They’ve got the suppliers by the danglers…the suppliers usually get loans for bigger premises more machinery etc to keep up with supp & demand…pull the pin 2 years down the line and leave the suppliers on there are…seen it happens few times

I remember this in 1986 when on M&S trunking.
Used to go into a small farm that made cheese just outside of Exeter, they had a few loans to expand & when it came to the next year M&S told them they would have to take less or out they went. Back then when Maggie was in, the average loans were around 10-15% interest. Same at another small firm selling strawberries at Cullumpton & Shipley …good old M&S …boots on the other foot nowadays though Lol