FMCG and the Workflow

Fast- Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) or simply known as Consumer Packed Goods are those
goods that are highly consumed on a regular basis and has short life span. One of the main
characteristics of FMCG is that they are affordable and are always on a high demand. Like- packed
goods, beverage, stationary, cosmetics, meat, dairy products, fruits, vegetables, and so on. The
FMCG industry can flourish and have a lot of profit, but the challenges are that these goods tend
to have a small profit margin and - in many cases - a short shelf life. This means that, in order to
thrive, FMCG companies must strive to sell as many units as they can as quickly and as
consistently as they can. This requires shrewd marketing (to get people to make an initial purchase)
and high product quality (to keep people coming back for more purchases going forward).
Based on the expiry date or shelf-life the goods are classified into 4 groups.
i. Super-fast goods
ii. Rapid-fast goods
iii. Target-fast goods
iv. Fast goods
Super-Fast Goods: Those products having expiry date of three months and shelf-life of 60 days
at the least, are super-fast goods such as- bread, milk, meat, fruits, vegetables, diet coke, etc.
Rapid-fast Goods: The goods that have an expiry date of 6 months and remaining shelf-life of
120 days are rapid-fast goods. All the beverage items are included in this group.
Target-fast Goods: These goods have an expiry date of one year and shelf-life is of minimum 210
days All the cosmetics and health care items are included in these groups. These are again divided
into food items and non-food items.
Fast goods: The products which has no expiry date or has a long shelf-life is included in this
group. For example: water, rice, wheat, and so many.

Product Category Chart

Product Category Product Example Product measurement

Dairy Products Yogurt, Laban, Milk, Cream, Butter,
etc.
Diet Beverage Diet Pepsi, Diet 7up, Diet Miranda, Diet
Coca-Cola, Coca-Cola Zero, Coca-Cola
lite, etc.
Beverage Item Pepsi, 7up, Miranda citrus, Miranda
Orange, Barbican, Mussy, Holsten,
Tropicana fruit drinks, Energy drinks
Two sizes are available, 185ml
and 250ml.
320ml is available for grocery
shop, 330ml is for restaurants
and glass bottle is of 250ml.
320ml is available for grocery
shop, 330ml is for restaurants
and glass bottle is of 250ml.
 (Black, Cod Red, Bison, Red Bull, Energy drinks are 185ml and
Spark), etc. 250ml.
Juice Al Rabie Juice, Rita Cans, Saudia Milk 185ml and 250ml is available.
Juice, Suncola, Sunquick, Suntop, Tang,
Vimto, etc.
Oil Afia oil, Al-Arabi oil, Maha Vegetable 750ml, 1.5L, 1.8L and 17L are
Oil, Dalal oil, Zaharati oil, Al-Raed oil, available.
Nasreen oil, etc.
Rice Babul, Mellow, Sunwhite, Al Bakherah, 10kgX4, 40kg and 25kg are
Taj Mahal, Taj Al Hind, Shalan, 777 available.
Sortex, Nanome, etc.
Sugar Al Osra, Saudi sugar, 777 Sortex sugar, 1kgX20, 2kgX20, 5kgX20 and
and Mellow sugar. 50kg is available.
Wheat Kuwaity flour Only 1kgX20 is available.
Sauces Rana, Gloyria, Freshco. Goody, 30ml, 50ml, 80ml, 100ml,
Mayasom. 150ml, 160ml, 210ml, 350ml,
500ml and 720ml is available.
Cheese Puck, Saudia, Goody. 150ml, 160ml, 210ml, 237ml,
350ml, 437ml, 500ml and
720ml is available.
Snacks Indome, Lays, Pringles, Al Joud Various types depending on
Vermicelli, Kuwaity Vermicelli, and the flavor.
Perfetto Macaroni, etc.
Tea & Coffee Lipton green, Mint, Leamon, Misri, Tea bag (100 pc, 25 pc)
Cathering, Al Khabos, Zee Tea, Hi tea, Tea powder (50gm, 100gm,
Rabaya, Nescafe. 200gm, 300gm, 400gm,
500gm, 1000gm, 2500gm,
5000gm).
Ice tea juice is 250ml in liquid.
Water Safa Makkah, Oska Bottle, Afnan 330ml, 500ml, 1.5L, 2.5L and
Water, Nova, Sky, Nestle and Tubak. 5L is available.
Chocolate Kit Kat, Bounty, Snekers, Nuttela, etc. Various types depending on
the flavor.
Masala Esterm, Vijay, Falcon, etc. 100gm, 150gm, 200gm,
400gm, 50kg.

Working Procedure of FMCG Company

Skill-based coordination of work makes it possible to assign the right task to the right people at
the right time. This ensures that only the best-qualified people are working on available and
prioritized tasks. This increases overall productivity and flexibility and leads to a more resilient
production setup. The working process of the company is described below using a chart and then
with step-to-step proper description.

Purchasing Team

Commercial Team

Production Company
Sells Team
Supplier Company

Receiving Team

Inbound TXW
FMCG Workflow

Putaway

TXC
Inventory
GB Print

Outbound Packaging Area

Dispatching Area
LMD
LMD Location Area

Receiving

Return

Customer Outbound

Inbound

Putaway
Sub-division of Inventory:

Inventory

Expiry Disposal IRT S2S Stocktake Relabel TXW RTO

Purchasing Team: The first stage of the work flow starts with the purchasing team. Noon
selects and orders the products through this purchasing team, where the team makes sure to recheck
if the shipment is highly demanding and fast moving. If so, then after discussion with inventory
team, the order is confirmed and sent to the commercial team. The team also informs the warehouse
about the shipment and based on the slot details and TPP, the inbound department keeps the
manpower active.

Commercial Team: Then the list is provided to Marketing team, where after market analysis
they prepares the PO to order it from the production company or the supplier company and sends
the PO to the sells team. After confirmation of the order, the supplier provides the delivery slot
details.

Sells Team: The sells team will approve the PO and order the shipments from production
company or the Supplier Company. The foreign products are ordered through the supplier. Some
products like oil, snacks, rice are also ordered from the supplier company whereas products like
beverage, juice, milk, and dairy products are ordered from the production company. After approval
of the PO, it is sent to the inbound receiving team.

Receiving Team: On the slot day, the PO generates on the Warehouse Management System
(WMS) which will contain the order details like- slot time, slot date, the price of the SKU products,
Total SKU quantity and expiry date. If the shipment arrives late, it will be rejected unless it is
requested by the purchase and commercial team and accepted by the warehouse Manager. If the
shipment matches with the PO, it will be accepted otherwise it will be rejected by the receiving
team. The receiving team must check on the products cautiously and make sure about the expiry
date, shelf-life, damaged products and will count the products manually one after another while
doing the full physical check. The team will then scan the products barcode to make them live on
the Noon website and afterward will send them to the Inbound team.

Inbound Team: The inbound team will create and print the barcode, attach it, and scan the
shipment barcode one-by-one to recheck and finally will hand over the products to the putaway
team.
TXW: The TXW is generated in the WMS and the Inbound team is to open it first using the
warehouse code. They print the barcode from this TXW. After completing the scan of the bar
codes, they close the job of TWX and marks as done. The TXW then automatically moves to the
Putaway team.

Putaway Team: After receiving the goods, the putaway team will hold it and ask the inventory
team for the location. Subsequently, the team will place the products as per the location provided
by the inventory team and scan the location code with the PDA to lock it and upload it to the WMS.
In some cases, there are more products than the location can hold. In these cases, the team asks the
inventory for a virtual location and places the remaining product as per the previous procedure.
After placing all the shipment, they will close the job of TXW which will then move to the
inventory team.

Inventory Team: This is the mitochondria of the warehouse. At this point the product is fully
under the management of inventory team until dispatch. The team is further divided into the
following subdivision-
Expiry: The first and foremost task of the inventory team is to continuously check the expiry and
shelf-life of the goods using the system. The products which reached expiry are separated and sent
to the disposal team. The products with less shelf-life and nearby expiry are separated too. The
team first cancels the current location of the product using PDA which will be a hold location for
up to two days. They will ask inventory management team for promo location and sent the items
for promotional sell. If they are ordered then they follow the normal dispatch procedure. If not,
they are sent to the disposal team.

Disposal: The expiry products are first listed one-by-one along with every detail like SKU
quantity, price, dates of entry to the WMS, etc. and will raise a ticket which means an approval
request will be sent for disposing the products. This ticket first moves to the warehouse Manager
through email for approval and then to the Inbound Core team, Commercial team and SLP
Manager consequently. After final check from the security team, the products will be sent to the
disposal machine. A supervisor, a team leader, two operators and a security team member must
stay along with the disposal team to observe and ensure the whole disposal process.

IRT: Inventory technical is the Audit team for the Inventory department. They prepare report for
every technical problem in the warehouse including temperature, system, product movement,
disposed products, missing products, return products, relabel products, promotion products and so
on. They must prepare the report daily and submit to the management team.

S2S: This Stock-to-stock team is the working bees for the warehouse. They are the personals who
move the products from one location to another. Like transferring product from the virtual location
to the main location. They are responsible for any movement of the products in the inventory.

Stocktake: This team works as the inventory inspector. They like being rivals to the inbound,
receiving and putaway team as their work is to inspect the whole inventory products and report the
excess, missing, damaged, expiry, barcode missing, etc. products by mail. They can claim the
mistakes of the inbound, receiving and putaway team up to four days of the placement that means
they must make sure about every product within four days of entry. In case of excess or missing
products, they will first inform the inbound team and then the inbound connects with the core team
and the Commercial team for a conference call with the Inventory team. A PO is generated based
on the meeting outcome about the excess and missing goods. For excess shipment, the inbound is
done again following the previous steps, to list them on the website and for missing shipment, they
will first check the PO of the inbound team physically. If the inbound is at fault, then they connect
with the supplier through the commercial team and makes a request for the missing shipment. After
receiving the shipment, they are scanned and listed by the inbound team and directly handed over
to the stocktake team. The stocktake also prepares a monthly report about the products which
indicates the work performance of the inbound team and receiving team.

Relabel: The primary task of the relabel team is to work with the return shipment. After disposing
the noon packaging, the outbound hands it over to the inbound team where they collaborate with
the relabel team in order to process the return shipment. First, they remove the previous barcode
and then prints and pastes a new priority basis barcode and places it directly in the previous
location. The secondary job is to work with the damaged or missing barcodes that are handed over
to the relabel team from the stocktake team.
TXW: The inventory team will directly divert the TXW to the stocktake team. The stocktake will
check each product and after confirming all the shipment, the stocktake will close the job for TXW
and transfer it to the expiry team as it has all the details about the expiry and shelf life of each
product.
RTO: The task of Reach truck Operator is one of the dangerous tasks in the warehouse as it
involves moving heavy objects. Their task is to hand over the ordered products to the Outbound
team.

Outbound: This is the point where the task starts as per the customer’s order. After the location
of the ordered product is sent to the team, they take out the product as per the order after scanning
the location in the PDA, order details and shipment barcode. Now the order is ready for packaging.

TXC: The TXC generates after an order is placed by the customer. This is same as the TXW of
the WMS. When the Outbound team will open the TXC, it will be assigned to the operators through
PDA. The operator will move to the product location, scan the product, and bring it to the GB print
area. The TXC is now open for the GB print area, where they scan the product and complete the
job to close the TXC. The TXC then opens for the packaging area and similarly after completing,
they close the job for the TXC and hands it over to the LMD team.

GB Print: The first task of the GB print area is to check the shelf life of the product and approve,
if it is within the timeline or reject, if it crosses the timeline. Then the product is packed in foil
paper or shedder roll and in case of dairy and frozen products, it is packed in ice box. And finally,
the PP barcode is attached and sent to the packaging area.

Packaging area: In the packaging area, the product is packed in Noon packets and customer and
delivery details is attached. The product is then handed over to the dispatch area.

Dispatching area: This dispatch area is the temporary storage space or location for the package
till it is delivered to the LMD.

LMD location area: The location where the packaging team delivers or handovers the products
to the LMD team is the LMD location area after scanning the PP barcode.
LMD/LPC Team: The Logistic Midmile Department is the product segregation area.
Customer Area: This is the segregation area and products are manually divided as per the delivery
zone and the drivers are assigned for the job.

Complete Dispatching area: In this area the driver will take the order and scan the PP barcode.
At this point the customer will receive a driver and delivery detail message.

Dispatched Vehicle: After all these steps the product will be finally loaded in the vehicle and
ready to deliver.

Customer: After delivery if the customer is satisfied, he keeps the product and if he is not
satisfied, it is returned. The returning process follows the below steps:

Return: When any product is returned, it reaches the LMD team first. They scan the PP barcode
first wile tacking returns from the driver. Then the parcel is sent to the Outbound team.

Outbound: After receiving the return goods, the outbound team will open the noon packaging and
dispose the packet. Then the shipment will be handed over to the Inbound team.

Inbound: The first thing that Inbound will do is dispatch the existing barcode and contact with the
relabel team to put new barcode. The relabel team will print and attach the new barcode to make
the entry in the online system and WMS. The product will be then passed over to the Putaway
team.
Putaway: For the return products the putaway team will work directly and will not ask for any
new location to the inventory team. They will put the product at its previous location and scan with
the PDA to make entry.

The industry today is constantly being disrupted by ever-changing consumer preferences and
new technologies. Customers demand innovative products, which means producing a wider
range of goods at higher volumes quickly. In developing markets, consumers are also spending
more, which raises the call for an expanded supply chain.
According to Allied Market Research, the global FMCG market is predicted to reach $15,361.8
billion by 2025, growing at an incredible 5.4% in the next five years. New avenues providing
greater business opportunities. Research from Statista also shows that eCommerce is growing
faster than traditional brick and mortar stores every year. Consumers are demanding new product
offerings such as healthier and sustainable products, and this is expected to open new roads for
FMCG players.