Starwood Part Five - Research Paper Example

Download file to see previous pages Using bed linens and terrycloth as the commodity on study, the paper looks at some of the procedures that will be required to procure only the best of the bed linen and terrycloth, citing cases where it is possible to change the suppliers dealing with a particular commodity or product. This paper furthermore explores Starwood evaluation method of the suppliers’ performance in relation to contract metrics that the company will use against the suppliers. Starwood- Supply Strategy Starwood is a multinational company with operations in North America and the Caribbean. It mainly concentrates its businesses in the hospitality industry with many hotels in the United States, Canada and the Caribbean. With such a huge presence in the hospitality industry, it presents a huge challenge especially when handling issues of procurement as all operations have to be coordinated. The procurement gets more challenging when it comes to the supply chain section as the process is continuous with the suppliers providing goods and services to the company. The president of strategic sourcing will mostly be the one in charge of ensuring everything runs smoothly when it comes to procurement. Some factors that might trigger the supply chain includes when sections of Starwood’s hotels might need to change products and get new ones , when the contracts with the suppliers expire and in some cases when the group in charge of the hotel designs come up with new ideas that need to be implemented. Cases where a specific hotel or resort requiring local contract will also call for the involvement of the supply chain department. According to Wieland and Wallenburg (2011), the supply chain is a very intricate and dynamic supply and demand channel. Usually supply chain is made up of various systems of business, people, expertise and machinery, information and also funds for the purpose of transferring a product or service from one party that provides it that is the supplier to another that needs it- the customer. During the supply chain, the end product delivered to the customer can vary from the raw natural resources and materials to machinery. Sourcing Strategy of Starwood When a product needs to be sourced to the hotel, it will have gone into consideration from the specification effected by factors like the customers, maintenance and even the chefs in the hotels restaurant or the housekeeping department in the hotel. If the said product or service is not available or does not exist, it implies that the sourcing will be done from both the domestic and international suppliers. In cases where the product is available then, only the renewal of the contract with the supplier will be viable but in some cases a new supplier might be procured for the supply (Anna 2006). A paper or electronic form will be sent to the potential suppliers requesting information of their services or products and the price quote and all the responses received by Starwood will be kept in a database to help in vetting the suppliers in future too. Thereafter, only the suppliers matching the company’s minimum requirement will be shortlisted. However this will not be necessarily based on the finance of the shortlisted company. Other factors will be considered like quality of the product and service, the area of operation, and also the legalities of the supplying ...Download file to see next pagesRead More