METRO strengthens central sourcing of fruit and vegetables
31 January 2025
For many years, METRO has been bundling the procurement of fish, meat and fruit and vegetables in so-called International Trading Offices (ITO), which specialise in ensuring a reliable supply of ultra-fresh products for METRO's wholesale business worldwide. A large proportion of the centrally sourced products are marketed as METRO own brands, offering customers in the food service industry an optimal price-performance ratio and a wide range of products. In addition, METRO is constantly improving its procurement efficiency through consolidated ordering and logistics as well as bundled negotiations with manufacturers.
And with great success: Last financial year 2023/24, the Valencia Tradition Office (VTO), which is responsible for the joint procurement of fresh fruit and vegetables for many METRO globally, increased its procurement volume by 15% to 290,000 tonnes.
The purchasing office currently works with around 300 suppliers and producers from more than 80 different countries, with half of the procurement coming from Spain. Around 50 commercial experts at VTO handle more than 2,000 F&V items every day in their daily work - and 17 METRO and MAKRO countries as well as Food Service Distribution (FSD) specialists Classic Fine Foods and R Express are already among its customers. The five most important product categories in terms of volume are oranges, potatoes, tomatoes, onions and lemons.
Another important task of the VTO experts is to work with METRO's quality assurance specialists to select the most competent suppliers. Quality control is ensured through regular visits and inspections to producers in the main countries of origin. Accordingly, all products sourced by the VTO are Global Gap certified. In addition to quality assurance, the focus is also on simplifying and standardising processes, product ranges as well as the packaging and labelling in order to bundle orders more efficiently for worldwide delivery.
