Building a Better Food Business by Digitizing Product Lifecycle Management 

It’s difficult to think of an industry that hasn’t experienced disruption due to the pandemic. The events of the past 18 months have driven businesses of all types and sizes to look for innovative ways—and emerging digital technologies—to circumvent the challenges. 

According to a September 2020 survey by McKinsey Global Institute, 85% of companies “accelerated the implementation of technologies that digitally-enabled employee interaction and collaboration.” It also stated that “35% “have further digitized their supply chains … by connecting their suppliers with digital platforms in supply chain management.” As a result, one of the tools that’s risen to importance is digital Product Lifecycle Management (PLM.) 

PLM plays an end-to-end role in today’s businesses-- across product ideation and development, all the way through manufacturing and commercialization – even through product end of life. It turns paper-based information into usable, centralized data, putting all your product lifecycle information on a single platform. The goal of going digital in this way is to save time and money, mitigate risk, and improve product quality and customer satisfaction.  

Taking Off in Hospitality, Restaurants and Food Services

PLM was originally developed for the manufacturing industry but its basic principles and benefits can be applied to nearly any sector. A few areas in which it’s really starting to take off include hospitality, restaurants, and general food service, where it can be used to increase supplier collaboration and profit margins while ensuring product quality and food safety. 

Food and hospitality-related sectors are all highly competitive and highly regulated, and have become even more so in today’s not-quite-post-COVID era. Customers are increasingly concerned with food safety in particular, and regulatory bodies are continually adapting to new challenges in food systems, while routinely introducing changes to standards and regulations. Food businesses also want to improve productivity and increase profits, earning both happy customers and increased revenue. All of these factors point to a greater need for PLM.

Modern PLM: A Foundation for Quality and Supply Chain Management 

Whether it’s a new product being developed in-house or a private label product being co-developed with partners, the foundation of any quality and supply chain management program is effective data management of product specifications. Modern, digitized PLM platforms can perform this type of comprehensive data management, with a process that spans from the very beginning of the product’s creation all the way to approval and commercialization, and every revision and variation in between.

That’s a lot of ground to cover, and anyone who’s ever been involved with bringing new products to market will tell you it’s an immensely complex process. It involves a broad cross-section of employees, departments, and even companies, as well as many steps, approvals and coordinated tasks. At the same time, balancing business needs with time-to-market goals and expectations for scaling up production while ensuring quality is also challenging. For these reasons and more, the PLM process is ripe for digital transformation. 

But the reality is that many companies still use manual methods, such as Excel spreadsheets, to manage critical PLM tasks. Without a digital strategy, these organizations run the risk of more costly, error-prone, and time-consuming processes–all of which can ultimately lead to an increased risk to customer safety and brand reputation. PLM software offers a modern solution that allows you to integrate, streamline, scale and automate product management processes to reduce or even eliminate these risks. 

Specifically, PLM can support hospitality, restaurant and food services business to:

• Fast-track innovation,

• Increase the efficiency of vendor communication around real-time requests for new ingredients, facilities, or joint collaborations,

• Create, control, manage and track finished and raw material product specifications,

• Compare product histories visually and side by side, 

• Automate workflows and gain the ability to view completed and pending tasks, 

• Quickly identify facilities and products impacted by recalls, and

• Assign and track tasks related to product development and new or updated standards and requirements, such as regulatory requirements.

Cloud: A PLM Gamechanger

One of the biggest advancements to hit PLM software in recent years is the cloud. Unlike legacy PLM systems, which tend to create fragmented pockets of data across an organization, cloud-based PLM stores all data and processes in a single centralized location, making it more accessible and easier to put to strategic use. Cloud-based PLM also allows real-time communication and collaboration across all parties engaged in your PLM program, both internal and external, and from any location with an internet connection. And most importantly, data is protected and can be accessed anywhere, at any time, by any authorized employee involved in PLM-related processes. 

It’s been a difficult few years for so many hospitality businesses, but one silver lining in the midst of all the challenges is the adoption of new digital resources and tools that can help restaurants and food  service brands evolve to raise their quality and safety standards, reduce risk, increase efficiency and build a consistently thriving operation. Digital PLM is one of those tools that can truly have a transformational impact—not just on your business but also on your partners, employees and, ultimately, the guest experience.

Author Bio: As Chief Product Officer and Chief Marketing Officer for CMX, Jim Hardeman directs and oversees strategy for all software products for the company. He leads a team of hungry, humble, and smart individuals who are dedicated to delivering the best cloud-based Enterprise Quality Management Software available. Jim's responsibilities include strategic initiatives, driving product direction, positioning, and marketing.