Advantage Australia has revealed why Diageo won its third Supplier of the Year trophy in five years at the 2020 Australian Drinks Awards.
The Australian Drinks Awards were live streamed this year and hosted by TV personality Shelly Horton.
Supplier of the Year was chosen via the annual Advantage Engagement Survey. The Drinks Association has been commissioning Advantage Australia for the past decade to conduct the annual survey, which provides members with favourability ratings and qualitative retailer feedback from the off trade, on premise and wholesale channels.
“The traits that most describe Diageo are focus and consistency,” said John McLoughlin (above), Managing Director APAC at the Advantage Group.
“Focus because every year this business sets out to be a retailer-centric supplier that excels in engaging its partners and consistency because Diageo has been placed in the top three for this award for six of the last seven years.”
Diageo Commercial Director Chris Shaw (pictured main) said: “The whole team at Diageo are proud beyond measure at being named 2020 Supplier of the Year at the Australian Drinks Awards.
“In a year that’s been like no other and that has brought challenges like none we’ve faced before, the Australian Drinks Awards are a moment of celebration and recognition of our industry when those moments are currently few and far between.
“I know how difficult the last six months have been for so many in our industry, in particularly our on-premise partners who have been so hard hit by the COVID-19 pandemic. I’m proud of how suppliers as a group have stepped up to the support the hospitality industry and it was great to see that collective industry response recognised in last night’s awards ceremony."
“Thank you to the award organisers The Drinks Association, and the Advantage Group, which runs the Advantage Survey. If the detailed survey results are anything like last year, then I think we’ll continue to see the evolving expectations of retailers, wholesalers and the on-premise being met by ever rising standards of service from all suppliers. We’re seeing increased capabilities and greater collaboration between supplier and customer which is fantastic, and bodes well for the future of our industry.
“Thank you to the entire team at Diageo Australia who all contributed to this result. With much change in the leadership of our commercial business units, it’s fantastic so see our new teams continuing to build upon the collaborative relationships with all our partners.”
Diageo also won the Category Management Award, which is new to the Australian Drinks Awards.
“Category management is a key contributor to the retailer supplier interface,” said McLoughlin.
“I like to think of category management as the common language that both retailers and suppliers speak. We know from our data that the skills of building insightful category development plans are highly valued by retailers and as such this is a key driver of retailer engagement.
“We congratulate Diageo on also collecting the Category Management Award this year. Well done Diageo on again delivering excellence in retailer engagement.”
Shaw said his team was thrilled to win the Category Management Award.
“I’m so proud of our category management team led by Kate Bean," he said.
"Winning this new award is recognition of our intent to put the customer and the shopper at the heart of everything we do in this space. We know that the biggest opportunity for our business and for our customers’ business comes from unlocking category growth, so we go into every planning session with a shared category agenda as our focus.
“It may be Diageo’s name on the award, but it’s not our award alone. It’s shared with our customers. It’s only through our collaborative efforts to build compelling joint category strategies and plans that we drive growth for all of us, led by market and retail insights, shopping insights, and consumer understanding.
“Our significant investment in our digital capabilities means we’ve been able to adapt at pace to a fast changing retail environment that will only continue to evolve in the months and years ahead.”
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