When a supplier changes a product, most food and beverage businesses check the allergen panel straight away and copy the rest of the spec sheet across on trust. Nutrition figures, shelf life, weights, country of origin and product descriptions then drift away from the product on the shelf. The cost turns up later, on a customer’s menu, in a write-off or on a credit note.
Why does the allergen panel get checked when the rest doesn’t?
When a supplier changes a product, there’s one part of the paperwork everyone reads properly.
The allergen panel.
That’s how it should be. Get allergens wrong and someone could be seriously ill. Everyone knows it, so the panel gets checked, checked again and signed off.
On paper, the rest of the spec sheet matters just as much. The ingredients, the nutrition figures, the shelf life, the weight, the country of origin, the description your customers see.
In practice, those details usually get copied straight from the supplier’s sheet. Or they’re carried over from the last version of the product. Then nobody looks at them again.
What happens when a supplier changes a recipe?
Take a foodservice wholesaler that supplies cooked chicken breast to a contract caterer. The supplier switches to a new seasoning and sends over a new spec sheet.
The seasoning contains celery. The technical team spots it straight away. They update the allergen panel the same day and let the right customers know. That part works.
But the new seasoning has changed other things too.
The salt and calories have gone up. The caterer builds its menus from the figures on file, so its menus are now wrong. And it’s the caterer’s name on them.
The shelf life is shorter. Goods-in still checks deliveries against the old figure. So stock with too little life left gets accepted and sent out. A few cases come back. Credit notes follow.
The online catalogue still shows the old description. The caterer’s buyer has no reason to think anything has changed.
Nobody has done anything wrong. The allergens were checked, because everyone knows they matter. The rest was believed, because it always had been.
What do unchecked product details cost?
Allergens get the attention because the risk is easy to picture. The other details carry risk too. It just turns up later, and somewhere else. On a customer’s menu. In a write-off. On a credit note. Or in a buyer who slowly stops trusting your spec sheets.
Over time, the product file drifts away from the products on the shelf. Each gap is small. Each one costs a bit of time and a bit of margin. And because nobody owns the whole file, nobody sees the pattern building.
How do businesses keep the whole product file accurate?
The businesses that handle this well don’t check harder. They check more evenly.
They give the whole spec sheet the same treatment as the allergens. When a new spec arrives, they compare it with the old one line by line, not just the allergen section. Every change is flagged and has an owner. Nothing goes live until it’s been approved. Then the same details go everywhere they’re used, from the order system to the customer catalogue.
Four checks to run on your own product file
If you want a quick test, try this.
- Compare ten recent spec changes. Pick ten products that changed supplier or recipe this year. Put the latest spec sheet next to what your system holds, and check every line, not just the allergens.
- Find out who owns the other details. Ask who updates the shelf life, nutrition figures and country of origin when a spec changes. If the answer is “whoever spots it”, that’s worth knowing.
- Look at last quarter’s credit notes. Pick out the ones caused by product details: a short shelf life, a wrong weight, a description that didn’t match what arrived.
- Check one product everywhere. Choose one product and look it up in your order system, your price list and your customer catalogue. Check they all say the same thing.
If the spec sheets and your system don’t match, your product file is out of date and nobody’s been told. If nobody owns the other details, they’ll only get fixed when a customer complains. If credit notes keep coming back to product details, you’re already paying for it. And if your systems disagree with each other, your customers get a different answer depending on where they look.
The allergen panel shows what good checking looks like. The rest of the product file deserves the same care, because that’s where the quieter costs come from.
Frequently asked questions
Why do product details go wrong when a supplier changes a product?
The allergen panel is checked because everyone knows the risk. The rest of the spec sheet, such as nutrition figures, shelf life, weight, country of origin and description, is usually copied from the supplier’s sheet or carried over from the old version, and then nobody looks at it again.
What does an out-of-date product file cost a food wholesaler?
Customers build menus from the wrong nutrition figures, goods-in accepts stock against an old shelf life, and catalogues show old descriptions. The cost turns up later as write-offs, credit notes, complaints and buyers who stop trusting the spec sheets.
How should supplier spec changes be checked?
Compare the new spec sheet with the old one line by line, not just the allergen section. Flag every change, give it an owner and approve it before it goes live. Then send the same details to every system that uses them, from the order system to the customer catalogue.
How can a food wholesaler test whether its product file is accurate?
Pick ten products that changed supplier or recipe this year and compare the latest spec sheet with what the system holds, line by line. Then review last quarter’s credit notes for product-detail causes, and check one product is described the same way in the order system, price list and customer catalogue.
Where Allsop fits
At Allsop, we help food and beverage businesses keep their product information right, through intelligent software for Customer Order Automation, Data Workbench and Customer Margin Management. That means new and changed product details are checked against your own rules as they come in. Changes are approved before they reach your orders and price lists. And the same details are held across your systems, so your team and your customers work from one version. Sales colleagues can keep growing share of wallet, knowing the details behind every product they sell will stand up to a customer’s questions.
If you’re moving ERP or have moved recently, our article on why prices change after an ERP migration looks at another point where product and price data drift apart.
Speak to Allsop, and we’ll look at how product changes find their way into your systems today.
