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‍Introduction
Traceability requirements have evolved rapidly in recent years, driven by stricter regulations and an increasing demand for transparency. Brands must ensure flawless compliance, and to do so, their traceability strategy must fully adapt to their specific needs.
Not all companies face the same challenges. Their production models, supply chain structures, and regulatory requirements are unique, and their traceability platform should be able to accommodate these complexities.
For example, some brands juggle multiple manufacturing models, requiring different approaches to effectively track suppliers. Others need to collect and validate specific data that go beyond standard market requirements. For fast-growing businesses, the ability to handle large volumes of data without compromising quality becomes a critical challenge.
Yet, many companies - even those already equipped with a traceability platform - face major limitations: rigid tools, unreliable data, lack of automation, or low supplier engagement.
The result? Partial, time-consuming, and difficult-to-use traceability.
So, is your traceability platform up to the challenge?
Discover the five bottlenecks that could be compromising your traceability process.
1. You struggle to engage suppliers beyond tier 1
A robust traceability platform should not just collect tier 1 supplier data (e.g., manufacturers) but also enrich it by mapping your entire supply chain, including raw material suppliers. If your traceability stops at the first level, beware: your tool is not a true traceability solution.
Why does this happen?
- Your suppliers lack a dedicated platform to submit their data and that of their subcontractors.
- Your platform doesn’t automatically follow up with tier 2, 3, and beyond—leaving your team to do this manually.
- The system doesn’t guarantee data confidentiality between supply chain partners, discouraging transparency.
- The platform isn’t designed to facilitate supplier collaboration, making data transfer between supply chain levels inefficient.
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A platform that doesn’t structure traceability across all levels won’t provide the visibility needed to meet growing regulatory demands—and this is just the first issue.
2. Your suppliers complain about your traceability process
Supplier engagement is critical to effective traceability. Your platform should make participation easier—not harder. If you notice slow response times, frequent complaints, or a low completion rate for requests, your traceability platform might be a roadblock rather than a solution.
Common causes include:
- Your platform is not supplier-friendly:
- The interface is too complex or unintuitive.
- It lacks proper translations for supplier languages.
- Suppliers receive redundant and repetitive requests.
- Your suppliers lack onboarding and support:
- They haven’t been properly trained on the system.
- They don’t receive assistance when facing difficulties.
- They don’t understand exactly what data your company requires.
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The result? Your entire traceability strategy suffers.
But low supplier engagement is just one symptom of a platform that isn't meeting your needs. Other signs may indicate that your tool is holding you back.
3. You spend too much time reprocessing your traceability data
A traceability platform should not only collect information but also structure and make it immediately usable. If you still find yourself manually reprocessing data in Excel or other external software, your solution is not meeting your needs.
Why are you still relying on manual processing? Several factors may be at play:
- Your platform imposes a rigid model: Instead of adapting to your requirements, it forces you to adjust your processes to its limitations. As a result, you waste time reformatting data to make it usable internally.
- It is not interoperable with your other tools: There is no seamless integration with your ERP, PLM, or PIM, making data exchange with other solutions impossible without manual intervention.
- The collected data is not usable as-is: Data is not standardized, as each supplier provides information in a different format. Too many errors and inconsistencies require manual correction before the data can be used.
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A high-performing platform should provide immediately usable data with minimal reprocessing required. If you spend more time reformatting and correcting information than analyzing and using it, your solution is slowing you down rather than helping you. And when data quality is not properly managed, another issue quickly emerges: inconsistencies in product and supplier information.
4. You identify inconsistencies in your product or supplier data
Reliable traceability relies on accurate and verifiable data. If you notice discrepancies between collected information (expired or missing certificates, incorrect production site addresses, conflicting data from different suppliers), it’s a sign that your platform does not guarantee data quality.
Why does this happen?
- Your data is not verified: The platform collects information without ensuring accuracy or requiring supporting documents (certificates, audits, attestations).
- Your documents are not consolidated: Compliance proofs are not directly linked to collected data, making validation more complex.
- There is no cross-checking mechanism: No automated control process detects inconsistencies (e.g., a production site declared differently by multiple suppliers).
A robust platform should incorporate verification and consistency mechanisms, ensuring every collected data point is justified and reliable. If not, you expose yourself to errors that complicate compliance and traceability management. This challenge intensifies further when certificates and critical documents are stored in a separate system, disconnected from your traceability platform.
5. You manage your certificates and documents in a separate platform
Traceability relies on documented proof (certificates, audits, attestations) that validate the accuracy of collected information. However, some platforms lack proper document management capabilities, making their handling time-consuming and inefficient. The result? Your teams spend countless hours searching, verifying, and manually processing these documents instead of focusing on traceability improvements.
Why is this happening?
- Your platform doesn’t link documents to other information: Its data structure was not designed to automatically associate a certificate with a product, production site, or supplier.
- No automation for reading and extracting information: Your platform does not leverage AI to extract key details (validity dates, references, compliance status), requiring all data to be manually input.
- Your documents are not proactively managed: There are no automated alerts for expired, missing, or non-compliant certificates, meaning you may discover too late that a critical document has become obsolete - putting product compliance at risk.
Your Checklist: Key warning signs to watch for
Conclusion
Your traceability platform can no longer be just a data collection tool. It must be a performance driver, ensuring seamless, reliable, and compliant traceability while simplifying internal processes.
If your current solution fails to meet these criteria, it might be slowing down your operations instead of optimizing them. Difficult supplier engagement, inconsistent data, administrative overload, and lack of automation are clear warning signs that your platform could be limiting your efficiency.
Have you recognized some of these bottlenecks in your processes?
It may be time to reassess your solution to ensure it fully supports your traceability strategy.
