Improving the relationship between wholesalers and their suppliers and also between wholesalers and retailers brings potential benefits that will help improve the product in terms of:
- Quality, range and design
- Delivery method, speed
- Communication, method and level of service
- Payment, quality of documentation and settlement time
- Prices, wholesale and retail price
A manufacturer can improve the relationship that they have with their wholesalers to the extent that the wholesalers would need to think long and hard before they switched to a rival supplier. For example by improving the communication and being proactive in automating much of the paperwork a manufacturer can add value to the entire product range and that may be just enough to encourage a wholesaler to invest time in resolving any potential problem as opposed to making it easy for them to dictate terms by threatening to switch to a rival supplier. By improving a business to business relationship the products that are supplied will become less of a commodity item and judged along with the whole fulfilment service, a service that may not be available with any Tom, Dick or Harry.
Wholesalers are often doing themselves a disservice if they only focus on price and do not adequately value the many benefits of working with a professional and well organised supplier, a supplier that will deliver on time, will supply products that meet strict the agreed quality and that have invoice and delivery documentation that is clear and accurate.
By conducting customer satisfaction surveys aimed not at the end user but at those involved in the supply chain there are many rewards to be had. It takes a degree of understanding and consideration as to the requirement of the other to establish good and streamlined business processes between any two organizations. With the introduction of more efficient order fulfilment programmes the manufacturer and wholesaler can both benefit.
It is in the interest of manufacturers to establish long term contracts as that will provide them with the security that is necessary for them to plan and reinvest, confident that their customers value the benefits that long term relationships can bring. By manufacturers and wholesalers working together the whole fulfilment process can be streamlined and companies can work towards a just in time model where the need to hold large volumes of stock is reduced and along with all the associated costs.
The starting point for such an exercise is an exchange of information that can be obtained easily by utilising online customer satisfaction survey software that is now widely available and that makes the whole intelligence gathering process quick, easy and cost effective.
