Reducing time to market by 50% for FMCG product innovations

What does agility mean in practice?

A multi-billion food and beverages company faced the challenge of getting new products to market quicker, knowing that part of the answer lay in working in a more agile way.

A compact Baringa team of three married a systematic approach with pragmatism and took a three-pronged attack: 1) we identified what was actually meant by agile within the client’s context; 2) we created a fast process that would enable them to siphon the best ideas and accelerate them through the organisation and onto supermarket shelves; and 3) we built capability in the client’s organisation, so that they would not be reliant on us in the future.

We built teams

Key to the required agility was helping the client build temporary teams across the business that would get together on a project basis, pooling the necessary skills. This involved identifying the core skills that were needed, then matching staff to skills-sets, and providing coaching and training to fill any gaps.

We built trust

With the emphasis on getting things done and doing things in the best interests of our client, the Baringa team demonstrated flexibility, pragmatism and nous at every turn. A significant moment was when they realised that a process the client had reengineered in the past was not performing as well as it could. So, although not strictly within the scope of the project, they took it upon themselves to completely redesign it within a couple of weeks, calling in experts from Baringa’s customer and digital team.

We built confidence

The key outcomes were a reduction of product lead-time by 50%, and a tried and tested process with new roles like scrum masters and product owners. Overall, our project has given the client greater confidence in their ability to innovate, allowing them to redefine the category and to compete with supermarkets’ private label brands based on quality rather than price.

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