Carlsberg to adopt The Bowtie method to maximize level of expertise

As organizations grow in size and complexity, companies look for ways to maintain a level of compliance. The Bowtie method is based on a diagram that shows the difference between proactive and reactive risk management. 

EuroPack Summit

It allows companies to identify hazards, assess and measure the risk of those hazards, and take proportionate action based on the risk.  

Speaking at the EuroPack Summit, in Lisbon, Portugal, last week, Thomas Delory, senior global category manager, secondary and tertiary packaging, Carlsberg Group, said there was an ‘efficient upside to sharing strategic ideas.’ 

“We’ve had a tendency to reduce supplier and customer interactions to one-on-one meetings with a sales person, or procurement. But, the buyers need to take some control and ensure everything coming from the suppliers is channeled through procurement​,” he said. 

“We want to set up a procurement, production, customer supply chain. The flow of information starts from the shelf. We are trying to focus on that putting the consumer in the middle of every decision we make​.” 

CSC (Carlsberg Supply Company) manages the supply chain network in Western Europe. It is also responsible for planning, procurement, production and logistics globally. 

Delory added, in terms of packaging, it depends on which country it is operating with and if it is can or bottle driven. He said the firm was trying to have a packaging portfolio by looking at the functionality of the packs; secondary, corrugated, solid board, labels, shrink film, carry handles, hi-cones, or mini-kegs. 

SRM initiatives

There are also tertiary pallets, kegs, crates, stretch films, glue, bag-in-box, beer liners, pallet links pallet coding. 

“We are a support function. Some categories will operate locally and we will run them globally, depending on the level of standardization. It’s a moving target as the industry is constantly evolving​,” he said. 

According to Delory, Carlsberg Group is building SRM (Supplier Relationship Management) initiatives based on commercial and operational excellence, innovation and sustainability as part of its packaging and design strategies. 

This year, it launched the Carlsberg Circular Economy as presented by the EU Commission. 

“Cradle-to-Cradle (C2C) is a design framework which ensures everything from the product design and component is returned back into the system without affecting the product. Currently, manufacturers are using resources but not replenishing them​,” he said. 

“We want to Reduce, Reuse, Recycle and Rethink the way we make things and use material more effectively and reduce the consumption of materials​.” 

Delory said 88% of Carlsberg’s consumers are becoming more environmentally and ethically aware and it found 55% would be prepared to pay more for sustainable products. 

“Carlsberg’s response is the circular community platform to work with our partners to eliminate the entire concept of waste in our supply chain using the C2C design framework​,” he said. 

“The objective is to support the Circular Economy, we are analyzing our packaging portfolio from a C2C perspective and develop products that are optimized for re-entry as a valuable resource in biological or technical cycles (upcycling - increasing the quality of raw materials)​. 

“If I take a shrink film I don’t know what all the chemical materials are in there. We are using our service provider EPEA to assess all our products, classify various components in a product or those that need to be phased out. Our main challenge is facing the not yet characterized material​.” 

Substance disclosure

For example, he said, in the US, EPEA made an assessment and realized 50% of components were not categorized and most people didn’t know what most of the components were for. 

“In heavy industry the product evolves and the original chemicals stay in the production process even though they are not needed any more as time has evolved​,” he added. 

“Today we work in a reactive or passive way but now we are working towards a positive rather than banned list. We are far from 100% substance disclosure - transparency is tricky because each industry sees this as their own know-how protecting their competitive edge​. 

“EPEA creates transparency without disclosure to all other industries, it gives a little bit of security to our partners to work in that direction and we will share our findings and design suitable products for C2C​.” 

The company has six founding partners in its Carlsberg Circular Community; RKW, Arkema, O-I, Petainer, Rexam, and MWV. 

The initiative was launched at the World Economic Forum (WEF) this year in Davos, Switzerland. 

“As a private company we took the plunge. We have synchronized our communication channel with our founding partners and packaging suppliers and we want to engage with NGOs​,” added Delory. 

“At the moment we have six founding members and it will take one year to learn and build confidence. Next is attaining certification. There are five levels in C2C; basic, bronze, silver, gold platinum and platinum but platinum has never been achieved yet.”