Digital platforms create unique customer opportunities
Nui client Hilmar has developed a digital trading platform — HilmarConnect Global — that offers its customers real-time solutions to transactional challenges.
Travis Coffey, director of cheese sales with Hilmar talks to Cheese Market News about how the utilization of digital technology has impacted the company’s business.
For companies buying and selling dairy products on a global market, price fluctuations create stressful situations. It’s difficult to predict where product prices are heading at any given moment, which affects the confidence in any specific pricing position.
Digital technology has made life a bit easier for buyers and sellers. Global transactions happen every minute of the trading day, which makes it critically important to stay up to date with product availability and price, even though these may change rapidly.
Prior to the availability of digital technology, trades were made over the phone, through email or even by fax. Prices could change, new players could emerge and product availability could diminish, all in the amount of time spent waiting for a call to go through or for someone to respond to an email. With digital technology, traders can see data in real time and make bids or adjust offers with little delay.
Hilmar has developed a digital trading platform — HilmarConnect Global — that offers its customers real-time solutions to transactional challenges. Recently I talked with Travis Coffey, director of cheese sales with Hilmar, about how the utilization of digital technology has impacted the company’s business.
Q: How is Hilmar using a digital trading platform?
Coffey: At Hilmar, we are always looking for ways to grow our relationships with customers and contribute to their continued success, just like they have contributed to ours.
One of the ways we wanted to do that was through digital trading. The world continues to become more comfortable with all things digital. We believe the use of apps, mobile devices and web browsers will continue to increase in business. We were thrilled to lean into this reality and be leaders in this evolving space.
HilmarConnect is the trademark brand name for our digital trading platform. We have segmented a few specific channels, geographies or product portfolios to sell on this platform, creating a unique value for each market. Today we have weekly trading events serving different channels, one focused on industrial markets and one focused on the global Cheddar market.
Q: What was the global trade process like prior to using HilmarConnect?
Coffey: One challenge as a cheese manufacturer is to be a consistent supplier as the price between the three major supply origins disconnects with one origin often more price competitive than the other two. This disparity results in a variety of challenges to be a consistent supplier to customers who value the Hilmar brand and products.
We took a step back and evaluated our traditional sales processes and asked ourselves how we could better serve this market segment.
HilmarConnect is designed to reduce this challenge and provide buyers access to our full portfolio of Cheddar products, allowing them to flex between major markets when market prices shift.
Q: How has the use of HilmarConnect changed how you conduct global business?
Coffey: The adoption of digital trading is a complement to our customer relationships — shifting the angst of an opaque pricing conversation to a transparent marketplace where price discovery happens in real time.
HilmarConnect allows buyers to secure future production from Hilmar up to 12 months in advance. The design allows buyers to secure an allocation in the future with a specific product in mind or flex to a different product when there has been a shift in markets, allowing buyers to flex to the highest and best use for their business and their customers.
Q: What value do your customers realize in using HilmarConnect?
Coffey: Helping our customers succeed is always at the forefront. We call it “Wowing our Customers” internally, and we strive to achieve it every day. We also wanted to build a platform that did things a bit differently. As an exporter of cheese for many years, we understand the global opportunity as well as the challenges to profitable growth.
Every customer is unique, so it is difficult to speak to all the examples we have heard, but for some it has simply been seamless access to the full Hilmar portfolio. Some enjoy the ability to match their supply of Cheddar directly to their demand, while others enjoy the ability to secure an allocation in the future and then find the right opportunity closer to the month of production.
Q: Where does digital trade fit in the global dairy industry’s future?
Coffey: We believe the use of digital trading platforms like HilmarConnect Global will reduce the friction between buyers and sellers globally. Real time and transparent prices give buyers not only access to product but confidence that the price is fair and represents true market price. This allows those businesses to focus on consumer demand rather than focusing on Cheddar price negotiations.
Digital platforms have changed the way companies in all areas of agriculture and the food industry conduct business and perform transactions. What hasn’t changed is the importance of the customer. Hilmar believes in technology that allows systems to become more efficient and allows for more efficient connection to customers. Connecting, sharing and understanding customers and their markets is critical to success and growth.
The shift to digital financial markets significantly accelerated information exchange, but physical markets have lagged behind. However, innovative platforms like those developed by Hilmar have bridged this gap, streamlining transactions. Digital tenders simply modernize traditional phone-based inquiries about bids and offers, enabling instant communication. Our Nui platform offers flexibility, allowing clients to choose between binding tenders (where bids/offers are visible) and blind tenders (where they remain hidden). In reality, suppliers worldwide already conduct blind tenders daily, often without realizing it. Now they can execute their purchase and sales in a more effective and efficient manner.