Two workforce related questions in the food and beverage
industry are: How do companies structure themselves, and what are the trends
that this industry is experiencing? The first question provides beneficial
insight into trends within the food and beverage industry, which is why it is
good to begin the conversation there.
So how would a company structure
itself in this industry? The problem with dissecting the companies in the
F&B industry is that there are extremely different types of companies. Some
are agriculturally based, which would rely primarily on manual labor, while
other companies are more based on mass-producing goods (such as bottling soda,
or packaging frozen foods), which would be primarily manufacturing labor.
Seeing that there are different types of companies within this
industry, there are a few key things to focus in on when breaking down
companies. Firstly, it is possible for companies control multiple areas of the
supply chain in order to produce their goods. This would allow a researcher to
see the best of where a company would allocate its workforce, which would
answer the question on how companies should structure themselves. This leads to
the second point that not every company has the ability to partake in multiple
areas of producing goods, which affects how the company structures itself. This
would mainly apply to smaller companies, as they would not have the resources
to expand / compete in multiple areas.
This is why you need to see how big the company is and what
parts of the F&B sector the company is in before you look at its structure.
For the bigger companies that can provide themselves with both the ingredients
and the ability to manufacture the goods, you typically will see a breakdown
focusing more towards manufacturing and marketing because that is how they
distinguish themselves from its competitors. On the other hand for smaller
companies you tend to see them highly focused on whatever there good is,
whether that be manual work such as farming or manufacturing because marketing
tends to be too expensive for these smaller companies.
See now
that there are breakdowns in what companies structure themselves in certain
ways, that plays a key role into the trends being experienced in this specific
sector. While it can be expensive to be a large company in the food and
beverage industry for a number of factors, big companies, like SABMiller, used
to move their workforce out of more expensive countries and into the cheaper
areas in the past, but now a newer trend appears to have emerged for all
companies. That trend is cutting down on waste.
Citing
SABMiller’s Sustainable Development Summary Reports of 2009 and 2011 SABMiller
focused on cutting down its expenses shortly after the economic crash. In the
2011 report it states, “We aim to use water as efficiently as possible and have
set ourselves the demanding target of reducing our water use per hectolitre of
beer by 25% between 2008 and 2015.” From the numbers of both the 2009 and 2011
report, SABMiller has been making a viable improvement reaching a remarkable an
improved 8% efficiency from 2008 from the 2011 numbers.
Many other companies have been trying to cut down on waste
after the financial meltdown as seen by the 2009 and 2010 market numbers within
the F&B industry. The 2009 and 2010 years in this industry were labeled the
“less is more years” because despite fewer sales, there was more profit. While
companies realized there would be fewer consumers due to highly leveraged
consumers that would not be able to purchase their goods, which led companies
to focus on efficiency. This is still the trend in the marketplace today, and
SABMiller is an excellent example of how being efficient is a workforce trend
that helps companies do well in the market place even if some believe the recession
could be ending soon. It does not only save the company money, but the company
is also working toward an ethical goal of being conscious of the world’s scare
resources.
Works Cited:
http://www.sabmiller.com/files/reports/2011_SD_report.pdf
http://www.sabmiller.com/files/reports/2009_SD_report.pdf
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