Question 1: Supplier Selection. Please respond to the following:

From your perspective, list and then explain the top three (3) criteria for selecting a food supplier for a hamburger restaurant in your state.

Use the Identification of Potential Sources a New Need/Requirement model in Chapter 12 and select a food supplier for ten (10) hamburger restaurants of your choice in your state. Describe and give reasons in your own words to.

" Can We Make In-House?"
" Can a Current Supplier Meet?"
" Can We Use Supplier Development to Create Supplier?"

Question 2:

I believe the most important criteria should be product freshness/quality. There are many factors involving health and product quality in the food industry, including FDA regulations and food preparation health and safety compliance. After that it would be price and delivery. Pricing is usually tied to the delivery. Food suppliers or distributors tend to prioritize by customer importance. The higher the cost the customer is willing to pay, the better the delivery and unfortunately the quality and freshness also.

I picked Gordon Food Service as the main beef supplier. Since these restaurants do not have the time or capacity to make build in house, it becomes a choice of who will get the deal. Current suppliers are too local and are very limited on supplying to local businesses. These restaurants need the capacity of having these beef products delivered fresh and on time to several locations across the state. There will be no need to select several sources, but just to be safe according to increased demand; an alternate supplier will be picked out of a list of potential local suppliers.

Question 3:

Suppliers. Please respond to the following:

Discuss three (3) legal and three (3) ethical considerations that you deem most important to your company or organization when forming a strategic alliance with a supplier.

Explain which one (1) of the evaluation methods is most appropriate to use by a small business. State your rationale.
Describe the strategic technology-based alliances of Amazon or Dell Computer eStore, and describe the competitive advantage to both and/or multiple businesses of the alliance.

Question 4:

A few of the legal considerations in sourcing on forming a strategic alliance with a suppliers involve, the capacity of creating price agreements, meeting industry regulated quality standards, and the capacity to meet specific corporate legal requirements. In addition, some of the ethical considerations would be their competitiveness, their ability to maintain professional behavior in negotiations, and the financial competitiveness in providing accurate pricing and quotes in negotiations.

In case of a small business, informal or semiformal evaluation methods are more efficient, since it requires less analysis and more focus on service and delivery. A small business is fast paced and requires more attention to detail in terms of service and delivery. I would also consider monitoring price increases, since this is a big factor in keeping or establishing permanent relationships with a small business supplier.

Amazon's alliance has become a trend in e-based business transactions corporations. Walmart is now associated with amazon and other sites to offer additional products on their own website. This generates the ability of finding resources in a fast, easy to compare manner. These strategic technology alliances are growing exponentially and will move from the store based to the online based means of procurement.