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Deloitte Debate: Do You Know Which Customers and Products Will Cost You Your Profits?

    What:   "Cost-to-Serve: Worth Digging For?"

    Who:    Frank Burkitt, principal, Deloitte Consulting LLP

            Kim Porter, principal, Deloitte Consulting LLP

            Doug Gish, principal, Deloitte Consulting LLP

    When:   Available immediately

    Where:  www.deloitte.com/us/costtoservedebate

Details: Cost-to-serve is a well-established approach for learning which customers and products matter most and how to manage them at the appropriate cost. Among top packaged goods companies, cost-to-serve is part of their DNA and the approaches they use are highly evolved. Should companies in other sectors adopt the practices of leaders in packaged goods?

"There's nothing like a recession to get businesses focused on what matters -- growing profitable customers," said Burkitt. "Cost-to-serve is an approach that can help companies recognize that bottom-line profitability, not sales volume or gross margin, is the true measure of success. It incorporates a broad range view of costs, so that you can track, measure and model every element of the equation to help improve profits. Cost-to-serve can give companies the information necessary for them to focus the right level of resources on the right customers and segments."

Porter and Gish also provide their respective views from the consumer packaged goods and heavy equipment sectors:

    --  A view from the consumer packaged goods sector -- in such a dynamic
        environment, cost-to-serve insights are critical to pinpointing how to
        drive profitability, opportunities to shift trade spend across
        customers/products, refine efficiency logistics programs, better align
        internal resources, fix the mix across retailers and, where necessary,
        even rationalize the product portfolio.
    --  A view from the heavy equipment sector -- beyond providing guidance on
        which customers and products matter most, cost-to-serve gives heavy
        equipment companies a unique opportunity to improve their core
        businesses. By understanding the true cost structure associated with
        specific customers, products, plants and channels, operating
        inefficiencies can be quickly identified and addressed.

To view Burkitt's, Porter's and Gish's points and counterpoints around these issues, as well as additional perspectives from the consumer packaged goods and heavy manufacturing sectors, please go to www.deloitte.com/us/costtoservedebate.

This topic is one in a series of Deloitte Debates that examine today's pressing business issues from multiple perspectives. New debate topics are added weekly. For a full library of Debates, please visit www.deloitte.com/debates.

To speak with Burkitt, Porter and Gish about these issues, please contact John La Place at +1 212-492-4267, or jlaplace@deloitte.com.

About Deloitte

As used in this document, "Deloitte" means Deloitte Consulting LLP and Deloitte Services LP, separate subsidiaries of Deloitte LLP. Please see www.deloitte.com/us/about for a detailed description of the legal structure of Deloitte LLP and its subsidiaries.

    Contact:   John La Place
               Public Relations
               Deloitte
               +1 212 492 4267
               jlaplace@deloitte.com

SOURCE Deloitte