What To Ask When Choosing A New Oil Supplier

Posted by Alexa Ketterling

Choosing the right suppliers can have a huge impact on the bottom line for your company. The decisions you make about your vendors can impact your pricing structure, the raw ingredient inventory you hold, cash planning, the overall quality of your product, as well as your company's profitability!  Choices around this topic touch so many parts of your business. So today, we want to help you with the guidelines for a new supplier evaluation. 

These are the questions that, as a buyer, you should be asking yourself as you are evaluating new vendors for bulk ingredient supply.  You may be sourcing oils or you may be sourcing something else; this analysis process should look pretty similar across the board.  Let's dig in!

Continue Reading

4 Things Bulk Olive Oil Manufacturers Should Always Be

Posted by Alexa Ketterling

When looking for an olive oil manufacturer, it can feel like fumbling in the dark. It's vital for your business that you work with a supplier who can help take care of all of your needs.

This is why we've compiled a shortlist of all of the things that we think you should expect — as a bare minimum — from your olive oil supplier. This applies whether you are searching for a new vendor or if you've been working with one for years. Making sure that you're working with an olive oil manufacturer who checks off on these four things will help keep your supply chain flowing smoothly.

Continue Reading

3 Types Of Bulk Oil Suppliers

Posted by Alexa Ketterling

 

You might not think there is a difference when it comes to bulk olive oil suppliers, but there is. Here is a quick break down of just a few different types and what they do.

Continue Reading

Important Information To Include On Any Industrial Food Purchase Order

Posted by Alexa Ketterling

An order you send to any food ingredient supplier is, at the very least, a gentleman's agreement on both sides. To be able to get just what you're looking for you will need to make sure that you include all the necessary details.

When was the last time you were able to order a shirt on, say, Amazon and you didn't have to specify the size you wanted, color, or your shipping address? You are probably thinking to yourself, never.

Let's begin to look at the different details you need to make sure you are giving your supplier on your PO. In the industrial industry, a purchase order is important, to begin with - it's basically your contract. With any contract, you will want to make sure that you specify in writing the details you have agreed on. You will also want to make sure you've covered everything that could affect your order.


Sometimes the details can be a wide range and you may not naturally include certain information because it doesn't directly affect you. That's why we have created a list of all the information that you should make sure you include when you're putting your orders together. This applies to any industrial food supplier you work with.

Continue Reading

What Benefits Should My Oil Supplier Be Offering?

Posted by Alexa Ketterling

As a purchaser of bulk oil ingredients and olive oils, you will find there are some expectations that should be set forth to your oil supplier.

Your supplier should always — no matter what — consider your company needs and goals FIRST and work to guide you to both the best ingredient for your food product, as well as the best choices for packaging, contracting, and other supply chain details. Overall, it should always be a mutually beneficial business agreement. You should feel like you won a great fit for a long term partner!

Unfortunately, there are many suppliers in the market today that can be unaccountable or let their own desires guide their business decisions. And this doesn’t just happen in the oil industry! Some of the worst things you may see would be if your supplier ignores you, they mis-ship product or quantities, if they don’t communicate on backorders, or — worst of all — if they promote adulterating or false labeling to be able to offer you a cheaper price just to win your business. Working with a supplier like that, you’ll ultimately lose out in the long run.

While you’re in the midst of your vendor search, keep the following list of benefits in mind that you absolutely should have in a long-term supply chain partnership.

Continue Reading

Industrial How-To Series: Choosing The Right Bulk Olive Oil Supplier

Posted by Hannah Broaddus

Centra Foods receives questions from hundreds of manufacturers each year on the best ways to select specialty oil ingredients that fit their many different corporate goals -- one being cost savings, particularly for manufacturers using olive oil.

There are many components that can affect the total price of your olive oil, including the different quality grades, the type of bulk packaging you choose, the volume of your orders, the distance of the shipping point and the experience or business model of your bulk supplier(s).

In this part three of the series, we're going to weigh in with the different factors that can make you choose one supplier over another, and how the features and offerings of your suppliers can affect the total "all in" delivered price of your oils. 

Continue Reading

How To Choose A Supplier of Bulk Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Posted by Hannah Broaddus

I talk with buyers every day who are debating how to choose the right olive oil supplier — and their job depends on it. Of course, Extra Virgin Olive Oil is not the only product that they are debating, but but the analysis process looks pretty similar no matter what oils you’re responsible for sourcing — the biggest difference being that olive oil usually involves importing which can affect a few different parts of your decision making process

In the olive oil vendor search process, you have to uncover a lot of information and answer a lot of questions for yourself. In this article, we’ll address each of the questions below and explain how each suppliers’ answer could affect your final choice.

Continue Reading

How To Choose An Oil Supplier

Posted by Hannah Broaddus

I talk with buyers every day who are debating how to choose the right oil supplier — and their job depends on it. Of course, oils are usually not the only product that they are debating, but but the analysis process looks pretty similar no matter what ingredients you’re responsible for sourcing.

In the vendor search process, you have to uncover a lot of information and answer a lot of questions for yourself. In this article, we’ll address each of the questions below and explain how each vendors’ answer could affect your final choice.

Continue Reading

Meet Our Team: Alexa Ketterling

Posted by Hannah Broaddus

Over the next few months, we will be giving you a sneak peak into the the lives of our team members: who they are, why they love the work that they do, and what they're passionate about.

Today, I'd like you to meet Alexa Ketterling.  She works in Sales & Marketing with Centra Foods, working with customers on a daily basis and helping to manage our social media presence.

Continue Reading

Centra Foods Expands Bulk Oil Offerings

Posted by Hannah Broaddus

 

 

Do you remember Centra Foods 5 years ago? What was once a small olive oil company has grown into a large organic and non-gmo oil supplier to manufacturers and food service.

In case you are searching for new oils in 2016, we wanted to spend a moment to review the full list of oils that you can now source from us. It’s not just olive oil anymore!

Continue Reading

Centra Foods Presents at The National Olive Oil Association Conference

Posted by Hannah Broaddus

 

Have you ever wondered what a group full of olive oil suppliers say when you’re not in the room? 


Or how we understand the weight of our own responsibility, as suppliers, to you — our customers?

Or how we look at the food industry in today’s market?

A few weeks ago, Centra Foods was asked to give a talk on “olive oil used in manufacturing” at the North American Olive Oil Association conference. What did we say to this request? Yes, of course! And today I’m sharing an insider’s look at that industry presentation with you. 

Continue Reading

4 Questions That Will Tell You If Your Oil Supplier Is Right

Posted by Hannah Broaddus

First dates.  

They're often awkward, sometimes exhilirating, and always the start of something new.

They're also are always filled with questions.  What do you do?  Where did you go to school?  What are you passionate about?

Of course, we do the same thing in business, right?  If you're searching for a new supplier, you want to find out as much about them as you can to see if they're a good fit for your company.  

Finding the right supplier is all about finding the right fit in terms of business structure, capabilities, size, facilities, capitol funding, etc. That’s why most people now call them supplier partners — it's not just about finding someone to buy from, it's about finding the right fit for a supplier “mate”.

Continue Reading

The To 5 Factors You Need When Deciding To Partner With A Supplier?

Posted by Hannah Broaddus

“What are the top 5 factors you consider when deciding to partner with a supplier?”

Procurious, a online community for procurement professionals, recently posed this question to your peers in one of their forums.

Procurement personnel from all over the world answered with their top factors that they use to decide upon suppliers. Interestingly enough, the discussion was weighted pretty heavily on one factor — trust. Trust, of course, encompasses a lot of different things, but there were almost 3x as many answers for this one factor than any of the others.

All of these responses could be grouped into about five different main priorities.

Continue Reading

4 Traits Your Edible Oil Supplier Needs To Have

Posted by Hannah Broaddus

You know that when it comes to choosing bulk ingredient suppliers, getting the lowest price isn’t everything.

In the last 10 years, the procurement industry has focused more on getting value-- real value-- from their vendors and suppliers. Most would even list this as a top priority when choosing a new partner.

How do you define value? A valuable supplier is one that partners with you, rather than just trying to sell you something. They bring something to the table that helps you improve your own business.

When it comes to choosing an edible oil supplier, here’s the 4 most important traits we think every oil supplier needs to bring to the table to prove their own worth.

Continue Reading

The Top 4 Benefits of Doing An RFQ For Your Annual Bulk Oil Needs

Posted by Hannah Broaddus

As most purchasers already know, an RFQ is a "request for quote".  Why do these RFQs benefit manufactures?

The real benefit comes at the end, when a supply contract is signed to cover the companies ingredient needs over the period. An RFQ is a simple, great way for manufacturers to get the lowest bulk oil price possible and reap a number of other benefits in the process.

In fact, we see 3 major benefits that manufactures get from doing an RFQ for their annual volumes, and signing a contract for their ingredient needs.  But first, we'll review what an RFQ is.

Continue Reading