Sacha Vaughan, chief provide chain officer at houseware producer Joseph Joseph, is in a lucky place – her board recognises the essential position of the availability chain in a digital age, which she suggests isn’t at all times the case.
“Many manufacturers see the availability chain as merely transferring packing containers from one place to a different,” she says. “The consensus is commonly that, ‘It’s not that troublesome.’ Nevertheless, we’ve had some ache prior to now. The board realises that the availability chain is extra than simply transferring packing containers from A to B, and it’s an enormous lever for value management. Subsequently, they deal with the availability chain strategically.”
Vaughan says this recognition of the significance of product fulfilment isn’t only a results of inside value pressures. She suggests provide chain chiefs have had an fascinating decade, characterised by a collection of disruptions, together with the coronavirus pandemic, Brexit and the implementation of latest tariffs following the change in US administration.
“We’ve been lucky and unlucky on the identical time,” she says. “The world has been significantly risky from a provide chain perspective. Nevertheless, the affect of those disruptions has helped to raise the availability chain from the basement into the boardroom.”
Embracing provide chain transformation
Vaughan joined Joseph Joseph in February 2025. Having fulfilled senior operations roles with Forma, Charlotte Tilbury and Shiseido, her earlier place was as international operations and manufacturing director at Dyson. She was approached in regards to the alternative to turn out to be chief provide chain officer at Joseph Joseph and was impressed after a dialogue with the agency’s co-founder, co-owner and CEO, Richard Joseph.
“I used to be offered the second I met him,” she says. “He’s tremendous good and an awesome businessman who’s actually clear on what he needs. He was somebody I knew I might work for, and I purchased into his imaginative and prescient. I completely love the product, and the founders – each Richard and Anthony – are pleasant to work with.”
Vaughan recognises there are similarities between her present and former employers, as each are design-led companies the place the founders stay closely concerned. Nevertheless, climbing increased up the profession ladder at Dyson required a transfer to Singapore. She says becoming a member of Joseph Joseph allowed her to attain her profession aspirations within the UK at an organisation she admired.
“Chief provide chain officer was undoubtedly my trajectory – it was the position I needed,” she says. “And so they have been providing that chance at an thrilling time. They have been searching for somebody to utterly remodel their provide chain, not do extra of the identical. I actually believed in that imaginative and prescient. And 7 months later, that’s precisely what we’ve executed.”
Vaughan says the availability chain she inherited was a bit underdeveloped. She describes the present provide chain as sedentary and conventional – she was given the remit to drive modifications and create a contemporary, technology-enabled strategy. Vaughan is specializing in transformation with the goal of growing an award-winning provide chain.
“That’s the motivation,” she says. “We’re not there now, however we will likely be. The expertise inside Joseph Joseph is sort of phenomenal. I’ve a crew of fifty individuals. We’re not an enormous firm, and but we’re taking the availability chain critically. And inside that crew, I’ve some good people that I’m simply grateful to work with each day.”
Taking advantage of digital and knowledge
Vaughan stories to Richard Joseph and is a member of the chief board. She manages the end-to-end provide chain and the strategic sourcing of the agency’s merchandise, which pulls on the specialist procurement crew beneath her wing.
“So, the attractive designs that we give you in London, we go and discover any person who can manufacture that product to our excessive requirements,” she says. “It’s about making certain we are able to try this activity on the proper worth and time.” Different areas of accountability embody demand and provide planning, customer support and order administration.
Digital and knowledge play a vital position in trendy provide chain operations at Joseph Joseph. “Know-how turns into extra essential each month as issues transfer on,” she says. “Finally, the world is just too advanced as of late for us to have somebody handing round items of paper. We must be systemically managed.”
“Know-how turns into extra essential each month as issues transfer on. Finally, the world is just too advanced as of late for us to have somebody handing round items of paper. We must be systemically managed”
Sacha Vaughan, Joseph Joseph
The corporate’s enterprise useful resource planning (ERP) system runs on SAP. Whereas this platform is essential for day-to-day operations, Vaughan says different areas of IT supporting the availability chain want work. Nevertheless, coping with that state of affairs rigorously is a part of her long-term plan to rework the corporate’s operational actions.
“I’ve purposely stored us a little bit bit undeveloped this 12 months as a result of I need to work out how we need to run issues right here. I feel some organisations leap into choosing the brand new shiny know-how after which attempt to bend their processes round what that know-how can do, and you find yourself with suboptimal provide chains,” she says.
“What I need to do is be tremendous clear on goals. Then we’ll go looking for the proper techniques that meet these necessities, versus shopping for a requirement planning system that doesn’t ship what the enterprise wants. I would like end-to-end integrations with techniques that every one work in the identical route and discuss to one another seamlessly.”
Vaughan says that making these choices will depend on figuring out methods to combine with clients and suppliers, allied to a cautious consideration of how suppliers will help the enterprise handle its stock sooner or later: “We’re taking a look at every part as an space of alternative whereas we work out how we do issues round right here.”
Working with trusted companions
Relating to the final route of journey for provide chain know-how at Joseph Joseph, Vaughan says software programming interfaces (APIs) are already the usual manner of speaking with associate organisations. She’s interested by exploring the potential of rising know-how, reminiscent of synthetic intelligence (AI), on the proper time for the enterprise.
“We’ve some parts of AI in our demand planning space, the place we make predictions about what our clients are going to purchase and after they’re going to purchase it,” she says. “I feel that’s a fundamental manner of utilizing AI, however there are extra prospects that we are able to leverage. Nevertheless, they’re not firmly on our roadmap in the mean time.”
Vaughan says any resolution to make use of rising know-how is made in live performance with the corporate’s IT director. Her crew works carefully with the know-how division. Whereas the IT division may like to maneuver quicker, Vaughan says it’s essential to mood expectations as she units her provide chain technique in stone.
“They’re like, ‘Oh, Sacha, that is all the good know-how on the market that we might use.’ And I’m saying, ‘Yeah, that appears good. Nevertheless, simply let me get my home so as.’ I don’t need to put sticky plasters over issues and have an issue recur in six months. [I want to] take a step again and repair our enterprise challenges with know-how perpetually,” she says.
I don’t need to put sticky plasters over issues and have an issue recur in six months. [I want to] take a step again and repair our enterprise challenges with know-how perpetually Sacha Vaughan, Joseph Joseph
Certainly one of Vaughan’s most essential strikes was to determine a brand new partnership for third-party distribution centres within the UK. Her crew ran a significant procurement train after she joined in February. In July, Joseph Joseph’s end-to-end provide chain partnership with XPO Logistics turned operational, and know-how performs a key position within the strategy.
“All the pieces’s bought to be effectively managed,” she says. “I used to be searching for a third-party associate who might make sure that we’re correctly, systemically managed. The information interface between us and XPO is seamless, with the proper knowledge in the proper place on the proper time, and interfaces that assist our enterprise, moderately than a scrambled strategy.”
Specializing in core actions
Joseph Joseph ships its inventory to XPO’s third-party distribution centre in Rugby, the place the logistics agency manages omnichannel fulfilment, warehousing, pre-retailing and distribution companies for purchasers – each main retailers and particular person shoppers. Vaughan says the partnership permits her crew to deal with rising the enterprise moderately than firefighting.
“You’ve bought to know the place your online business is and what’s core to you and the place you need to focus,” she says. “I firmly imagine that in the event you get the proper associate, then logistics turns into a quiet a part of the enterprise. As a result of it’s the tip of the chain, it may be tremendous noisy. Nevertheless, when fulfilment goes effectively, no one talks about it, it’s tremendous quiet, and you may get on with the stuff that’s going to manage your prices and develop your online business.”
Vaughan recognises that some firms select to take management of fulfilment internally. In lots of instances, significantly for giant companies, she says that’s a misguided strategy. Profitable digital transformation is a difficult course of, and utilizing the data of an professional like XPO Logistics means her crew will help Joseph Joseph ship higher buyer experiences.
“Warehouse administration techniques are costly – they take a whole lot of improvement, and a whole lot of know-how is required to make issues seamless,” she says. “It’s a whole lot of work operating the distribution centres, and it’s a distraction out of your core enterprise. Giving this accountability to people who find themselves consultants, and who can do it in a sustainable, repeatable, scalable manner, is way more environment friendly, particularly for a rising enterprise.”
Vaughan displays on the modifications she’s seen throughout her time on the operational entrance line and is optimistic in regards to the position of provide chain officers within the digital age. As extra boards get up to the chance to make use of high-quality fulfilment as a strategic lever for progress, she says the alternatives for her friends are important, as long as they recognise the essential position of digital transformation.
She says: “We want to consider key questions, reminiscent of, ‘How are you going to begin with the shopper and work again to make issues frictionless?’ That’s the place know-how and provide chain must be targeted. Increasingly more, that’s the route of journey, and provide chain leaders who’re profitable would be the ones who’re actually targeted on the shopper.”
