Is your company prepared for a product recall?

Does your business have an emergency product recall process in place?

According to GS1 Recall, many businesses believe a product recall won’t happen to them, so don’t prepare adequately, leading to potential damage to their business and reputation. 

The Drinks Association's Corporate Partner GS1 Australia operates the industry-developed GS1 Recall solution, a multi-industry service used by hundreds of Australian companies and endorsed by major grocery retailers including Woolworths and Coles.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) reports that last year there were 593 recalls across all consumer categories.

In September alone, two drinks companies faced recalls. A chemical agent described as “very dangerous” contaminated eight brands of alcohol from G J Wholesale spirits; while Schweppes removed a lemonade from shelves that had been incorrectly labelled as a zero sugar product when it was actually full sugar. 

GS1 Recall is a secure web-based portal for the management of recall and withdrawal notifications. Based on global GS1 standards and best practices, it simplifies and automates the exchange of information between suppliers, distributors and retailers as well as government agencies such as Food Standards Australia New Zealand (FSANZ) and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC).

The online portal system allows the sponsor of a recall to enter all information including the reason for the recall, the affected product, the batch numbers and any other relevant information to expedite the removal of all associated products from the supply chain.

GS1 Recall keeps the information securely in the cloud, allowing for simple, easy and timely access to all actions in one place, and facilitating end-to-end visibility up and down the chain.

Manual paper systems including faxes and mail are no longer efficient for managing a recall in today’s fast-moving environment. Traditional recall methods can take days to reach the person who will carry out the recall.

GS1 Recall delivers emails or texts (or both) to those nominated by the organisation.

“Most organisations don’t keep staff knowledge up to date, nor practice a regular mock recall/test regime," said Maria Palazzolo, CEO of GSI Australia. "In a crisis these companies are more likely to make mistakes, have incomplete recall responsiveness, or take far longer to close out the recalls.’’ 

GS1 Australia recall services sales manager Andrew Brown recently told FoodMag: “Companies need to prepared to act in a crisis.

“What we help organisations do as part of a mock program, is create a template recall notice. That template enables them to go into a product recall meeting prepared to get the right information, rather than having that meeting, going away and filling out forms, and then having more meetings.” 

Recalling products quickly also helps keep a brand’s reputation intact.

“Consumers want to feel like they can buy your products again,” Brown concluded.