Specifications for wholesale

Can someone help me please........

My background is retail so I understand what information n specifications is required, almost anything and everything however I have just moved my career to storage and distribution for Frozen materials into food service.

I am writing specifications for our customers but my suppliers feel like I am asking to much of them regarding information I require as some of there specs are very standard. I suppose I am applying the retail but IMO more is better.

I asked one supplier for dimensions and microns for the packaging they use which they are asking why do I need this!

Can somebody give me advise to what information in their opinion I should be asking for or for the basics I need for wholsale

Thanks

First :welcome: to IFSQN!

Next:

Let me ask you this.

What you are doing is taking someone's complete food product and shipping it to other people correct?

Is it necessary information for your customers to know the small details like the micron of the packaging?

Part of the issue may be that your supplier may not want to be constrained into using a specific thickness if they decide to change packaging later it may be outside the spec you wrote.

If you feel it is necessary information that you need to have on there then go back and explain your position to your supplier and try to convince them that you need the information... but let's say you supplied a school.  They don't need to know the micron size of the cardboard case or the thickness of a yogurt cup... So it's kind of a balancing act between having a ton of information and having an appropriate amount of information.

Do you have a spec template?

Dear Astro, "spec template" is just the tip of the iceberg because essentially there are no real easy "generic" templates to deal with the variations that millions of unique companies require... but here is a start:

I dealt with WQA (an Aussi/NZ Food Safety standard) in the past, http://www.wowlink.c...WQA/SampleSpecs

• Woolworths Sample Submission Specification - Food (Produce) Download DOC 149Kb
• Woolworths Sample Submission Specification - Cleaning Download XLS 43.6Kb

These can be a bit much, as Mr. Incognito mentioned above "it's kind of a balancing act between having a ton of information and having an appropriate amount of information."  In MS Word that you can easily modify to your liking.

Cheers

Welcome!  What has been said above is good information and I agree.  Remembering that you have to maintain this information you want to keep it as simple as possible and it is also important to have wiggle room.  If your supplier usually uses a 1 micron film (just pulling numbers out of a hat) and he is out and decides to use a  2 micron film because it won't negatively impact anything....does anyone care?  Because in the end the spec should be followed and with wiggle room can account for Murphy's law. 

Question for you intelligent people. LOL  :ejut:

Should I be getting the supplier to complete my specifications or should I request a specification from them to transfer into my specification.

IMO I should get them to do the work and complete what is required...... and when I send it onto my customers remove the suppliers information for confidentiality purposes

What's your thoughts as this will be very helpful to me to get other Tech bods opinion!!!!

Thanks

Usually I request a specification and generally I get the information I need, however in some cases you don't get what you want or need then I have to request the specifics I need.  Most companies are going to give you the most relevant information. 

Thanks for the info