Costa Coffee selects GEP for indirect spend transformation

The UK’s largest coffeehouse chain, Costa Coffee, has selected GEP as its partner for the transformation of its source-to-contract procurement process.

Headquartered in Loudwater, Costa Coffee is a coffeehouse chain with 2,800-plus coffee shops in the UK and Ireland, and 1,100-plus globally in 25+ countries. The stores sell hot and cold drinks, sandwiches, cakes and pastries, and snacks. Costa Coffee also has restaurants in its portfolio, and provides standalone coffee machines to business and organisations across sectors.

As part of its companywide digital transformation agenda, Costa Coffee is upgrading the workings of its supporting functions, including procurement.

The procurement function is responsible for the purchase of all goods and services needed to run the company, from coffee beans and chemicals (for flavouring) through to IT systems used by staff. The procurement team is responsible for aspects including sourcing, negotiating terms, purchasing items, receiving and inspecting goods, and contract management.

For its indirect spend, Costa Coffee has launched a major project aimed at streamlining and automating the source-to-contract processes. Also known as source-to-award, this process spans the full lifecycle when sourcing products or sources: sourcing suppliers, inviting them for bidding, pre-onboarding evaluation, onboarding the right fit, negotiating deals to entering into a contract, and then ongoing contract and supplier collaboration.

Indirect spend refers to all spending for supplies and materials that are required for the day-to-day running of a business, such as IT hardware, software, maintenance, facilities, maintenance, utilities and travel, among others (the purchase of coffee beans for example is direct spend).

GEP has following a competitive bidding process been selected to support the transformation. The firm will provide advisory services around optimising the source-to-contract process, the system used for running Costa Coffee’s new source-to-contract processes (‘GEP SMART’), and implementation support.

“We selected GEP because of its proven procurement software and expertise to help us continue to grow and deliver new value to our customers and shareholders,” said Xavier Martinez, chief supply chain officer at Costa Coffee.

Headquartered in the United states, GEP is a consultancy specialised in the procurement and supply chain domain. The company provides and end-to-end offering, from consulting and technology, to solutions and managed services.

Last week, GEP was named of the UK’s top consulting firms for procurement services.