Storytellers Have the Future: Taking a Closer Look at US Food Supply Chain Issues

📢 Storytellers have the future: after chatting to a few women working in food procurement in the mid-west recently, I wanted to share their insights related to the future of the food supply chain in the US and the challenges faced by the cattle farming community.

🛒 Protein is now appearing in surprising places- bagels, popcorn, caffeinated protein milk to name a few products that come to mind. The importance of a protein rich diet goes hand in hand with the surge in people on GLP1 meds. According to a recent webinar hosted by The Beverage Industry and Circana - A third of consumers are looking for new foods that are high in protein including coffees and drink mixes. For instance, Silk almond milk introduced a new product that delivers 8 x the protein of their original product 

💼 We chatted to a few women who work in procurement at various food manufacturers in the Midwest to get to the bottom of some of these popular wellness trends and learn about how their relationships with cattle farmers and food ingredient suppliers is evolving in these challenging times as they look to future supply problems. 

📉 The average age of the American cattle farmer is 69 and there aren’t enough future leaders stepping forward in this industry. Major food retailers are primarily concerned with the price point that customers will tolerate for beef not about future supply issues. The WSJ touched on other challenges for Midwest farmers in their recent podcast titled “Can a Farming Community Resist a Development Boom?”. 

🤝 Given that the role of procurement gets more kudos when the world is falling apart – how can women in procurement help save the world and become a procurement goddess? A good place to start is to listen to your suppliers, build trust in the supply chain and work in a collaborative way.