Government scrutiny and regulations regarding
accounting practices are at a heightened level in
all industries. The CPG sector has received its fair
share in the past year. Articles in
USA Today and the
Wall Street Journal reported the
SEC's
involvement in looking at financial reporting of
period sales activity that pays the retailer for
volume purchases, simply to attain a gross
revenue/earnings projection. As reported in USA
Today, Bristol-Meyers Squibb is currently under
investigation for this common CPG trade promotion
practice and as a result, had to adjust their 2001
gross revenue and earnings statements.
Evolving regulations and much tighter monitoring of
CPG manufacturers' trade promotion expenditures has
made it imperative to have a proven closed-loop
trade promotion management system in place.
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Your
TPM system should have the capability to track and
identify the loading and forward-buy components of
your trade promotion spending, by customer, by
product size/flavor/case UPC, and by event. Your TPM
system should also help you document the planned
sell-through, spending and ROI versus the actual
results using both internal and syndicated data.
The Synectics Group has dedicated itself over
the past
year period in developing the industry
standard closed-loop TPM software application,
Account Review. Account Review™
TPM will place
your organization in a leading edge position to be
compliant with the current and future government
regulations, in addition to maximizing the
effectiveness/efficiency of your substantial trade
promotion investment. |
