Consumer Brands launches contactless delivery group

The Consumer Brands Association has launched a new task force, bringing together 23 consumer packaged goods (CPG) companies and retailers to study the impact of a contactless pick-up and delivery protocol to create greater efficiencies and reduce employee risk during deliveries. The Contactless Delivery Task Force brings together manufacturers, supply chain partners, and retailers to develop scalable, uniform standards for safely transporting and exchanging freight, with an initial focus on electronic bills of lading (eBOL).

“COVID-19 challenged CPG companies to keep their supply chains moving efficiently and their workers healthy in a tremendously difficult environment,” says Tom Madrecki, Consumer Brands VP, supply chain and logistics. “As CPG companies identify ways to increase supply chain efficiencies and ensure employee safety, electronic delivery verification through a contactless pick-up and delivery process is a natural solution. We’re excited to bring the industry together to create standards that will allow companies to provide consumers around the world with the products they need every day.”

Transferring from a paper delivery verification system to a digital platform provides safety, productivity, and visibility benefits to every employee involved in bringing a product from a manufacturer’s warehouse to the store shelf. Digitization allows back-office personnel to receive real-time updates while working at home as well as lets drivers and recipients practice physical distancing at the point of delivery.

Consumer Brands will unite task force members in supply chain roles throughout the CPG industry to work with its supply chain partners, Accenture and Coyote Logistics along with Vector, a transportation digitization and workflow solutions provider, to implement an end-to-end contactless pick-up and delivery pilot program. The development of this solution will foster better understanding of the data and process standards needed to encourage industry-wide adoption at scale.

How the pandemic is affecting one CPG brand:

“While a major disruptor, COVID-19 now gives us the opportunity to partner across our industry and develop the processes and procedures that will define the consumer packaged goods space for years to come. Health, safety, and efficiency have always been our priorities, but now we’re forced to look for new and innovative ways of incorporating technology even further to serve our customers and communities and meet their needs in this evolving environment.”

—Yone Dewberry, SVP and chief supply chain officer, Land O’Lakes