International Business: Supply Chain of Italy Starbucks

The supply chain of Starbucks is a centralized system. Starbucks makes use of a single centralized system to direct its supply chain and logistics network all over the world. By doing so, the company has a capacity to operate and manage several world distribution centers centrally with ultimate control; five in the USA, two in Asia, and two in Europe. Because the supply chain of star bucks is a centralized system, the supply chain operations in Spain resonate which the supply methods used in the rest of the world.

Ethical sourcing is one characteristic of Starbucks supply chain. This is because the company believes in acquiring high unprocessed coffee from suppliers and using the right machinations to process it. All this the company does to give the customers the right quality; this brings about repeat purchases, and the reputation of Starbucks soars across the entirety of existing and potential market share (Chae, 2015).

Starbucks is a proponent of a Supplier Diversity Program which concentrates on building and preparing all the farmer communities that are affiliated with it. What's more, the supply chain program of the company reaches out to said farmers with the help of incentives (cash and seedlings) and farm services to promote the quality of the end product. With such an approach the management is well aware of the fact that Starbucks and the farmer community will have a win-win situation at their disposition (Sigala, 2014).

A supplier code of conduct is another consideration that was factored into the companys supply chain in Spain. Through this, the company looks to demonstrate 100% commitment to the welfare, sustainability, and economic improvement of the Spanish people and places in Spain that help in the production of Starbucks products and services. Secondly, it is the desire of the company that all the supply chain procedures that define it stick to the local laws and international recommendations concerning human rights, safety at the workplace and employee compensation and treatment (Lee & Vachon, 2016).

Additionally, Starbucks works daily to meet and exceed international standards and national laws when it comes to matters environmental protections, and the minimization of negative ecological impacts subject to the operations of suppliers. The commitment of the company to the measurement, reporting, monitoring, and verification of processes out to always stick to to the supplier code of conduct of star bucks; only through such will Starbucks forge out and pronounce its niche in the face of stiff competition.

Looking at the bigger picture of what Starbucks Supply Chain is all about, the company is simply looking to base its efficiency on four basic supply chain tenets. These include planning, sourcing, making, and delivering.

Planning is the very initial of steps and it involves the making of viable strategies that will achieve supply process efficiencies for Starbucks. Secondly, the sourcing process seeks to find the most responsible coffee growers within Italy and the rest of the world; this is a surefire way of realizing quality coffee beans; said quality also manifests in the end product. Making the coffee is the most detailed of the supply chain process; one that the company places most concentration on. Finally delivery tops it all, and here packaging is everything.

In a nutshell, it is worth mentioning that the approach taken by Starbucks when it comes to matters revolving around efficiencies in supply chain is very sound. Perhaps the company can accredit the entirety of its success to its efficient supply chain processes; it is all part of the companys overall customer centricity approach.

References

Chae, B. K. (2015). Insights from hashtag# supply chains and Twitter analytics: Considering Twitter and Twitter data for supply chain practice and research. International Journal of Production Economics, 165, 247-259.

Lee, K. H., & Vachon, S. (2016). Supply Chain Sustainability Risk. In Business Value and Sustainability (pp. 245-280). Palgrave Macmillan UK.

Sigala, M. (2014). Customer involvement in sustainable supply chain management: A research framework and implications for tourism. Cornell Hospitality Quarterly, 55(1), 76-88.