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It is 2023 and the Food Safety Industry has evolved in dramatic fashion over the past 20 years. The role of the CEO in food safety has increased radically and for sound reasons. Protecting consumers and the company brand are of upmost importance for the CEO for the business to succeed in the current consumer climate. Food safety programs are no longer a nice to do. Rather, they are critical to the company’s going concern.
It’s important for the CEO to understand what exactly they are managing in terms of a food safety program. First, CEOs of food companies want to produce safe food for consumers. Second, CEOs want and need to protect the company brand. The simple question for CEOs is “Would I feed this product to my children daily?”
A food safety program protects your customers and brand from allergens and foodborne pathogens. In terms of Food Safety, studies have shown that companies that do not monitor, or have processes to improve food safety, perform poorly in specific areas.
Foodborne illness has been around for as long as there has been food. However, the identification of these microorganisms is an evolving science. CEOs and managers who do not keep up are destined to make poor critical decisions about their business. It’s one thing to read media reports on the latest outbreaks and recalls, it’s another to understand the unfavorable impacts that these recalls have on your consumers, employees, and operations.
To be successful, it’s important to realize that CEOs of food companies are now managing risk. This goes beyond managing the business. It requires a great understanding of why food safety is important to the business, the risks involved, and how you can diminish or eliminate those risks. Doing so will provide a return to your business.
For many food businesses, there is an urgency to address food safety head-on. Many businesses are taking the opportunity to turn food safety into a competitive advantage. By creating a risk-intelligent culture across the entire business, including marketing, the approach is to develop consumer brand loyalty. The risk of the consumer dropping a product they believe to have substandard food safety performance cannot be taken lightly. Consumers are much more in tune with food safety than they were 20 years ago.
The challenge is clear that food safety programs protect the consumer and your brand and is not an option to be taken casually. Rather, it’s a major key to the business’s survival.
