How TELUS TPM transforms promotion planning for ACH Food Companies
Executive summary: promotional planning transformation
ACH Food Companies has built a successful portfolio of iconic brands, achieving top market positions across their categories. However, the company's trade promotion processes were fragmented across multiple systems and spreadsheets, creating limited visibility into trade spend ROI and inconsistent promotion forecasting.
By implementing TELUS Trade Promotion Management, ACH transformed their approach from volume-based to profit-focused operations. The solution provided integrated planning processes and comprehensive analytics that eliminated spreadsheet-based workflows and delivered unprecedented visibility across all trade spend activities, demonstrating how unified trade promotion management can drive measurable growth for consumer goods companies.
Software used TELUS Trade Promotion Management
Enhanced forecast accuracy: Achieved 25-30% improvement in forecast accuracy through enhanced promotion forecasting capabilities
Profit-focused transformation: Shifted from volume-based to margin-based promotion planning approach across the entire organization
Accelerated analysis capabilities: Reduced analysis time from one full week to just 30 minutes through automated reporting and analytics
Omnichannel integration: Unified promotions management across traditional retail partnerships and digital marketplaces like Amazon through seamless platform capabilities
About ACH Food Companies
ACH Food Companies, Inc. is a prominent consumer packaged goods company competing in baking ingredients and cooking oil categories. Their iconic brands include Mazola® and Capullo® oils, Karo® corn syrup, Argo® corn starch, Patak's® Indian cuisine and Fleischmann's® yeast brand and are some of the most iconic on the market.
The challenge: Overcoming fragmented promotion planning and lack of trade spend visibility
ACH Food had always prided itself on delivering the best possible service and products to all customers. However, ACH Food faced significant business challenges with disconnected processes and poor visibility between departments. These issues made it increasingly difficult to improve operations and reach company goals. They also needed a flexible and scalable solution to fit their strategy for product and consumer growth, including acquisition of key partners.
The company faced multiple challenges that hindered their growth potential:
Lack of visibility into trade spend ROI and promotion optimization in retail
Disconnected business processes between departments
Long annual planning cycles without adequate promotion insights
Inconsistent promotion forecasting causing departmental misalignment
Business focus on revenue and volume rather than profit optimization
"We were gaining little insight into our trade spend and the sales team wasn't using their time in the most effective way. We knew why we had to take action, but were not sure how."
Bob Schmidt
Director of Customer Marketing, ACH Food
These issues greatly affected how quickly decisions were made. Too much time and effort went into planning and promotion activities. There were not enough insights from promotions to drive real business improvement.
The solution: using TELUS Trade Promotion Management (TPM) for comprehensive promotion planning
After gaining senior executive support, ACH embarked on a transformational journey with several key objectives:
Improve trade effectiveness and transparency
Focus on simplicity and ease of use
Leverage industry best practices
Involve cross-functional teams to drive internal collaboration
Improve discussions with retail customers
ACH began by mapping out current processes, understanding best practices, designing future state processes and determining gaps. The original intent was to select and implement a new trade promotion management (TPM) system. However the initial analysis laid groundwork for a transformational journey that broadened scope beyond implementing a "new sales tool."
The new scope brought new organizational stakeholders into the conversation, including finance, accounting and demand planning. The effort also led to a review of their SAP system, master data, sales and operational planning process, and how the settlement process was being managed across departments.
After evaluating the marketplace, TELUS TPM was selected because the solution and team provided the best fit for their organization. The key to finding the right partner was finding a functional fit, an easy-to-use tool that supports cross-functional organizations and a partner that understands and adapts to their needs.
TELUS Trade Promotion Management brought a new approach to trade promotion management and optimization, supporting an integrated planning process. The system provided intuitive and user-friendly design with powerful embedded reporting, analytics and optimization capabilities.
Key implementation features
ACH took a phased implementation approach, first starting with planning functionality to support their annual planning process, followed by deploying the settlement process. This approach drove immediate user adoption following training of sales and broker teams, while realizing benefits early in their annual planning process.
The integrated platform provided:
Advanced promotion forecasting: Sophisticated analytics enabling accurate demand planning and promotion insights
Comprehensive promotions management: End-to-end planning and promotion execution with embedded optimization capabilities
Enhanced CPG data integration: Tight SAP integration providing full closed-loop planning and execution processes
Powerful promotion insights: Embedded reporting and analytics delivering new levels of visibility
Streamlined workflows: Automated approvals offering tighter controls and accountability
The implementation team assisted ACH through change management efforts and end-user training, enabling substantial progress in their transformational journey.
"Shifting from a volume-based approach to a balanced profit focus was eye-opening for the whole organization. Analyzing promotions quickly revealed that many long-running ones we thought were profitable actually weren't."
Bob Schmidt, Director of Customer Marketing, ACH Food
The results: achieving 25 to 30% forecast accuracy improvement through advanced promotion planning
Implementing TELUS TPM revolutionized ACH Food's capabilities and processes. The comprehensive solution delivered measurable improvements in growth and operational efficiency across multiple business areas.
Financial results:
Superior forecast accuracy: 25 to 30% improvement in forecast accuracy
Increased profitability: Improved margins and trade effectiveness
Strategic transformation: Profit-focused transformation with account managers becoming better business managers
Comprehensive analytics: Enhanced customer P&L including contribution margin and retailer-focused scorecards
Operational improvements:
Process transformation: Eliminated significant manual processes and spreadsheets in planning and promotion activities
Enhanced promotion insights: Pre-promotion insights, scenario planning and post-event analysis capabilities
Streamlined workflows: Unprecedented visibility to trade accruals, forecasted volumes and spending in one integrated system
Improved efficiency: Analysis capabilities that previously took a full week could now be completed in 30 minutes
System performance:
Comprehensive CPG data management: Unified visibility across all trade spend activities
Advanced promotion forecasting: Sophisticated analytics supporting strategic decision making
Unified collaboration: Cross-functional teams working with consistent data and insights
Implementation success factors for promotion planning
The TELUS TPM implementation transformed how ACH Food operates across their entire organization. The platform gave them the tools they needed to optimize promotions more effectively and streamline their planning processes.
After the system was live, ACH realized another significant benefit when they decided to sell their spice business. The team significantly reduced effort to split out the spice business and quickly segregate trade liabilities, demonstrating how the automated system became essential for operational efficiency and supported complex business transitions.
Expanding promotion planning capabilities across omnichannel retail environments
ACH Food Companies continues to expand their portfolio through strategic acquisitions like Anthony's Goods. The natural and organic product manufacturer has a strong Amazon marketplace presence.
With TELUS TPM, ACH can leverage comprehensive promotions management capabilities across all channels where they operate. Our trade promotion management solution provides sophisticated promotion planning for traditional partnerships with distributors and retailers as well as Amazon.
This unified approach to trade promotion management provides consistency across both traditional retail channels and digital platforms. This helps maximize growth opportunities for manufacturers in today’s omnichannel marketplace.
Key takeaways for consumer goods companies on promotion planning
This case study demonstrates how TELUS TPM can transform promotion planning for CPG companies by converting:
Fragmented promotions management into integrated planning and promotion systems
Limited promotion insights into comprehensive data visibility
Manual promotion forecasting into automated, accurate planning processes
Volume-focused approaches into profit-optimized strategies
Single-channel promotion planning into unified omnichannel strategies spanning traditional retail and digital marketplaces like Amazon
TELUS Trade Promotion Management (TPM) helps deliver measurable CPG growth through promotion planning
TELUS Trade Promotion Management has helped consumer goods companies worldwide achieve substantial growth through sophisticated promotion planning and comprehensive promotions management systems.
Our platform transforms manual processes into streamlined operations that deliver measurable results across complex retail partnerships and digital channels. Whether managing traditional distributor relationships or expanding into online marketplaces, TELUS TPM provides the unified capabilities needed for sustained growth.
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TELUS Trade Promotion Management delivers the advanced analytics and integrated planning tools CPG companies need to maximize ROI from every trade promotion.
