Manufacturing Journalist Thomas R. Cutler Looks At A Traceability Reality Check In Food Quality

Contrary to popular belief, traceability is profitable, according to manufacturing journalist Thomas R. Cutler in the current issue of Food Quality magazine. The food safety industry has long viewed traceability as a strategy that enhances business and pays for itself in the process. While these are worthwhile objectives, rarely has traceability been linked to profitability.

Preventing recalls is best, but when a recall becomes necessary, minimizing the damage is critical. "Advanced recall trace-back and track-forward technologies allow for a recall alert to be initiated within minutes, reducing potentially bad news to one news cycle and saving food companies millions of dollars in long-term brand rehabilitation costs," says Gary Nowacki, CEO of TraceGains.

In avoiding a recall, the best technology solutions will continuously monitor the enterprise, co-packers, contract manufacturers, and upstream suppliers for compliance with business rules and regulation mandates. Real-time alerting and risk assessment will add an extra safety net and layer of brand protection. Some systems provide continuous compliance and risk assessment dashboards, bringing exception-based management capabilities to the entire organization. 

William R. Pape, co-founder of TraceGains, says, "A food company with an advanced traceability system means real-time alerts can be generated when something is wrong in the supply chain and that near real-time views of the operation make better operational decisions possible." He adds that in-house traceability systems cannot complete these tasks because a food company must automatically collect the relevant information from each process step, maintain identity across product transformations, and reroute these data into an event-oriented data mart, possibly adding some electronically collected new data. This event-oriented data mart then contains the pedigree of each carton leaving the plant as well as a repository of product attributes and key events during the life cycle of each production unit.

TraceGains, Inc. (www.TraceGains.com) was founded in 1998 with a 100% focus on Positively Assured TraceabilityTM. The company has a patented delivery system-14 patents granted and growing-and also is an authorized Issuer of United States Department of Agriculture Process Verification Program (PVP) Label.

TraceGains is not just about reducing risk; these unique technology solutions help companies turn disparate data into actionable business and value chain intelligence; it turns traceability from a cost center into a profit center. TraceGains customers typically experience a better than 300% return on investment (ROI), and an average profitability increase between 3-5%. Independent, peer-reviewed university studies confirm these findings.

TraceGains Inc.

www.tracegains.com

Marc Simony, Director of Marketing

traceability@tracegains.com

(303)682-9898