Reducing operating costs by integrating a food supply system

This paper describes the cost reduction strategy followed by a group of five Mexican restaurant enterprises located in the Monterrey metropolitan area. With this new alliance, a new integrated raw material supply system was required to take advantage of the synergies and economies of scale achieved on raw material acquisition and storage and transportation activities. To determine the new system it was required to define food suppliers, to analyze and determine the distribution scheme and the consolidated ordering and truck scheduling options. The implementation of the system is in initial stages, however current and projected results are provided.

I. Introduction

Nowadays, in this highly competitive industry world, companies aim to maintain competitive advantages by using state of the art technology, lean processes, low labor and raw material cost and low transport rates. While must companies try to keep their resources for their own benefit, a different kind of strategy is presented in this paper. Unity makes strength, and in this case it means that alliances between companies could result in a highly beneficial edge.