Do we still need reps on the road?

Welcome to The kbbreview Podcast, your host as always is Andy Davies and this week we're looking at the communication between suppliers and their retailers.

Since Covid there has been massive shift in how this is done, the traditional rep-on-the-road model has morphed into a hybrid of some area sales managers and a lot more emails, portals, Zoom, Teams, webinars and the like.

From the suppliers point of view it's not hard to see why. Reps are expensive and can only cover so much, but technology allows direct communication and exchange of important updates and information easily. 

For the retailers, however, they like face-to-face, it's their bread and butter after all, plus they have potentially dozens of suppliers and that means dozens of portals, emails, updates and Zoom calls to get through - and the onus is on them to do it.

So it's time consuming AND the volume of information coming this way means that they may miss important updates such as price changes or stock availability.

Andy caught up with a few key suppliers to ask them what they think. Is there still a role for the rep on the road, and how do you get important messages across when the inbox is so noisy…

But do retailers agree? We ask them too....

What do you think? Email Andy at [e-mail] or find him on LinkedIn here

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