All retailers all over the world are under the pressure from both consumers and governments. As a matter of fact, retail compliance is something that they need to deal with, especially if they have many stores in different towns or in different countries. The most complex thing is then to comply with all the regulations, notably if the products put up for sale are potentially hazardous such as consumer packaged goods or CPG. Here are the major points you need to know about retail compliance.
Retail Compliance: Auditing the Existing Procedures
It is certainly the first thing to do if you want to succeed your CPG and retail compliance. Clearly, it is crucial to audit in details the procedures you already have. This operation allows to determine the strengths and the gaps in the retail organization. Hence, it can be the starting point of many improvements. Only few retailers think about periodic compliance audience even if it is one of the best ways to put hand on the smallest issues before they cause truly catastrophic consequences. At the same time, make sure that all of your vendors do their own auditing procedures. Every retailer must perform internal audits and can even host external auditors if needed.
Retail Compliance: the Labelling
Labelling is an important task for an international or even a national retailer. According to the type of products you are offer for sale, your labels should always meet a set of requirements that might include the ingredients listings, the allergen labelling, the safety advisories, the font specifications, etc., and the translation of all these according to the countries you plan to sell your products. You should know that if the labelling is not compliant, you will have huge problems in selling your products and consumers packaged goods, especially on an international level. Think about applying compliant “over stickers” on top of the existing labels if you are looking for a more cost-effective idea.
Retail Compliance and Processes
One of the best solutions to avoid mishaps is making regulatory compliance a priority at each step of your retail organization. This can imply that you need to appoint a specific expert or team to manage the whole retail compliance program and report to the highest levels of leadership. On the other hand, it is essential to develop some standardized processes in order to avoid the risks of human error that might cause compliance problems. Of course, every employee working on the retail organization must know those processes.
Retail Compliance and GDPR
If you have stores and professional web sites that target European clients, your retail compliance will inevitable go together with GDPR or General Data Protection Regulation. Since its entry to force in 2016, most companies have been under en obligation to maximize the protection of their customers and sales leads’ personal data. Clearly, if you collect any personal data to improve your marketing strategy, you must agree to ensure the protection of that data so that its owner is totally safe from cybercrime and hacking.
