Insights – Quality Assurance
17 April 2025
“Product quality is our top priority”
Daniela Fetecauova, Senior Vice President of Quality Assurance at METRO AG, leads the professional quality assurance experts at METRO - and thus responsible for the entire process and all aspects of METRO's quality promise as a wholesaler. Ideal conditions to find out more in this interview about the work of quality assurance, the influence of the sCore strategy and the importance of digitalisation.
What specific role does Quality Assurance (QA) play at METRO as a wholesaler?
Fetecauova: The QA department plays a crucial role in securing and maintaining food safety, quality and compliance consistently and reliably across the supply chain, thus ultimately enhancing METRO’s brand reputation and customer trust and loyalty.
The technical backbone for this is the Quality Management System (QMS), that runs through the entire organization across all channels to ensure proper production and manufacturing, logistical handling as well as storage and distribution of the goods, especially for ultra fresh assortment like meat, fish, fruits & vegetables, as well as regular hygiene & safety checks.
Moreover, Supplier and Product Quality Management is specifically deployed for our own brands and ultra fresh food through regular risk assessments, audits and a monitoring plan. By this we have a dedicated and proven system to safeguard our own brand quality which is a key competence of METRO and a key lever of our sCore strategy.
Could you elaborate which aspects are particularly important in QA?
Fetecauova: We have defined three priorities in our work. First and foremost, it is product quality, particularly with focus on our own brands and ultra fresh assortment. Our customers choose METRO primarily for the products as they have long-standing trust in the quality and freshness of our offers. Therefore, we have implemented a quality management system globally to ensure that our own brands always meet the customers’ expectations. Moreover, we strive for continuous quality improvement through constant communication with customers.
Secondly, as METRO is a multichannel wholesaler, it is crucial for us to have proper quality control infrastructure and processes in place to govern all relevant channels and throughout the entire supply chain. It´s about safeguarding the safety, quality and freshness from the production at some of our FSD companies’ own facility, with the Logistics Service Providers to our warehouses and onwards to our wholesale stores as well as the FSD depots and the further delivery towards customers.
Last but not least, we continuously push for digitalisation to enhance the efficiency and transparency of our work. We are already using advanced digital tools and solutions extensively to address critical points of the supply chain, including own brand supplier assessments, own brand product development and quality controls in our warehouses, stores and FSD depots. This also includes exploring the feasibility of AI application as the next step.
You have just mentioned own brands quite a few times as a key priority. How is QA involved in the OB development process?
Fetecauova: The own brand development process is a cross-functional exercise that requires close collaboration between procurement, own brand management, supply chain management and QA. We play a role already in formulating the quality requirement profile for the specific own brand items, such as ingredients, sensory, labeling and packaging, based on the market benchmark, customer needs as well as appliable local legal regulations.
We are also involved in the supplier selection process. METRO’s OB suppliers must be certified on GFSI (Global Food Safety Initiative) recognized standards or comply with METRO Assessment Solution (MAS). In addition, we visit producers’ sites in person for checks and audit based on risk assessment criteria. Currently about 90% of our own brand suppliers around the world are GFSI certified, with the rest compliant with MAS audit. Another important step we are doing is to run sensory testing session in our internal product assessment centre with professional chefs to make sure products selected fully meet the customer needs.
And how is QA deployed to safeguard the quality once the own brand product is on the market?
Fetecauova: After the product is launched on the market, we regularly check its quality at the accredited laboratories, at least once a year, based on a risk assessment. In addition, the sensory testing with professional chefs is regularly carried out to ensure that product characteristics and quality are in line with the latest market benchmark. Also, customer feedback is carefully analysed to address any concerns - and in case of any non-conformity, we respond promptly by activating instant corrective and preventive measures. Moreover, we conduct random audits of the producers to enforce GFSI standards and carry out regular quality checks and audits at our warehouses and stores.
How do you measure the performance of the QA efforts overall?
Fetecauova: We rely on NPS (Net Promotor Score) monitoring as a key tool to measure the satisfaction of our customers, with product quality being critically relevant criteria in all countries for many years. And we are pleased that our high quality is continuously among the factors why customers trust METRO. More specifically, we also measure our performance through regular quarterly monitoring that tracks our continuous improvement in terms of product quality and safety. That includes, for example, the share of suppliers certified with GFSI recognized standards, or the number of quality-related complaints or non-conformities in our regular laboratory testing.
As part of its growth strategy, METRO is pushing for simplicity, efficiency and customer proximity. What does this mean for QA’s work going forward?
Fetecauova: As mentioned, we will continue to drive digitalisation of our work as it not only enhances efficiency in QA, but also boost the overall operational productivity and thus elevate the service level. Moreover, own brands will continue to be a focus in our work – and having professional chefs directly involved in the product development and quality assessment is a very unique and value-creating approach. Going forward, we want to further build on this by enhancing customer communication on the products safety & quality secured by our QA competence.
Quality assurance of own brand products
At METRO, Quality Assurance (QA) plays an important role in securing, maintaining and optimising the high quality of our product portfolio – especially with regard to own brand products, where QA is involved in the whole product lifecycle process.
When developing own brand products, QA formulates the quality and sustainability requirement profile for the specific items, such as ingredients, sensory, health & nutrition, labeling and packaging, based on the market benchmark, customer needs as well as appliable local legal regulations. The samples from the tendering suppliers are then tested in QA’s global assessment centre to evaluate the concerned product’s sensory, fitness for use as well as packaging. Professional chefs are involved in this analysis to ensure the expectations of the professional customers are fully met.
When the produced goods arrive at the logistics warehouse, QA checks are carried out efficiently with digital tools on the inbound shipments with regards to quality, freshness, cold chain integrity, package but also order fulfillment. Once the products are in the wholesale store and FSD depot for distribution, comprehensive and regular HACCP control is run digitally by QA experts to secure full compliance with food safety standards at various control points including temperature, hygiene and product’s shelf life.
QA experts also undertake field trips to visit suppliers and check their sites to ensure suppliers selected are certified on GFSI (Global Food Safety Initiative) recognized standards or comply with METRO Assessment Solution (MAS). In addition, QA performs supplier inspections in its regular audits based on risk assessment criteria.
As QA is committed to continuous quality compliance and optimisation of the own brand products, quality monitoring is regularly run at external laboratories also after the product launch. Moreover, frequent customer feedback is another important channel for QA to further improve own brand goods to better address customer needs.
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